Cyclist
5 key storylines for the 2024 women’s pro cycling season
With the calendar hurtling towards the 2024 season, it’s the ideal time to look ahead to the upcoming year in women’s cycling.
Will we see the return of the Women’s Tour? Are SD Worx’s days at the top numbered? And who will fill the Annemiek van Vleuten-shaped gap in the peloton?
Here, we pick out five of the biggest storylines and issues to watch out for in women’s racing next year.
Who will succeed Annemiek van Vleuten?
Dutch legend Annemiek van Vleuten retired at the end of last season, bringing the curtain down on a career that saw her cement her place as one of the GOATs of women’s cycling.
She took a hat-trick of Grand Tours in 2022 and almost went back-to-back this year, but in her final major race, the 2023 Tour de France Femmes, she rolled over the line in a disappointing fourth place.
Fellow Dutchwoman Demi Vollering claimed the maillot jaune instead, capping off a successful season that saw her fulfil her long-awaited potential – and present herself as an heir to Van Vleuten’s dominance of women’s racing.
Vollering also took a clean sweep of the Ardennes Classics this year and with the formidable force of SD Worx behind her, she looks the one to beat at next year’s Grand Tours – especially when the Tour de France takes on Alpe d’Huez.
Canyon-SRAM rider, fan favourite and Gravel World Champion Kasia Niewiadoma also enjoyed a successful Tour de France, finishing third and winning the polka dot jersey after soloing away from a squabbling Van Vleuten and Vollering on the queen stage before she was caught in the fog on the Tourmalet.
Lidl-Trek’s Elisa Longo Borghini was forced to withdraw from the Tour with illness and will have unfinished business with cycling’s most prestigious race.
DSM-Firminech’s Juliette Labous and Ashley Moolman-Pasio of AG Insurance–Soudal–QuickStep will also look to build on successful seasons and take advantage of Van Vleuten’s retirement, with an empty spot to fill on the podium of pretty much every race. There’s also a new generation of GC contenders coming through, which we’ll get to later.
Can anyone stop SD Worx?
Women’s cycling was dominated by one super-team in 2023, with SD Worx – home to Vollering, Lotte Kopecky, Marlen Reusser, Lorena Wiebes and more – winning 11 stage races and 15 Classics, overpowering other teams with their strength in depth.
The team won four of eight stages of the Tour de France with four different riders, showcasing their superiority in the mountains, on the flat, and in the time-trials.
In one-day racing the team holds the trump card of Classics specialist and green jersey winner Lotte Kopecky – called the ‘Wout van Aert of women’s cycling’ by L’Équipe.
She even mounted a GC challenge at the Tour, producing a stunning performance on the Tourmalet and in the final time-trial to finish second overall behind Vollering.
But like all super-teams – Team Sky in the 2010s springs to mind – SD Worx has been involved in its fair share of controversy this year, ruffling feathers when Vollering drafted behind the team car after a flat tyre on Stage 5 of the Tour, receiving a 20-second time penalty.
It didn’t change the overall result in the end, but directeur sportif Danny Stam slammed the UCI for the decision and was then banned from the race for dangerous driving and backchat to the governing body.
There was also drama within the team at Strade Bianche, when Vollering and Kopecky sprinted against each other for the win, which seemed to make things very awkward afterwards. With Vollering able to win the Classics races in which Kopecky specialises and Kopecky able to challenge for overall victory in the biggest stage race – not to mention Reusser winning stage races of her own and Wiebes wanting Kopecky’s green jersey – will they be able to maintain team cohesion?
Attention is sure to be on them next year as they eye further dominance – and aim to stay out of trouble. With other teams closing in at the top, women’s road racing has never been more competitive.
The next generation of elite riders
2023 saw several young and U23 riders coming up through the ranks and challenging at the top end of races. Especially after Van Vleuten’s retirement, these younger talents will have even more room to shine next year.
One standout from this year was Canyon-SRAM’s Ricarda Bauernfeind, who became the youngest-ever stage winner at the Tour de France Femmes aged 23. She soloed to victory on Stage 5 from a long-range attack, which even heavyweights Reusser and Liane Lippert couldn’t rein in before the finish.
Canyon-SRAM have stacked their roster with more up-and-coming young riders like Antonia Niedermaier, who won a mountain stage ahead of Van Vleuten at the 2023 Giro – her first WorldTour level event – before she was forced to abandon after a crash the next day. She was second overall and leading the young rider classification at that point, so it’ll be great to see what she can achieve in better circumstances next year.
Another young climber to watch is Lidl-Trek’s Gaia Realini, a mountain domestique for Elisa Longo Borghini and a GC contender in her own right. She almost won the UAE Tour ahead of Longo Borghini and was third at both the Giro and Vuelta, where she also claimed the polka dot jersey.
Brit Anna Shackley, who rides for SD Worx, has mainly been a domestique at elite level – unsurprising given the strength of her team – but had a great year in U23 races and classifications, placing second at this year’s Tour de l’Avenir and European road race, and third in the World Championships Road Race. Shackley turns 23 in May, so will be looking to take the next step at the top level in 2024.
Shirin van Anrooij is another to watch, stepping up from winning best young rider at the Tour in 2022 to win her first major race at Trofeo Alfredo Binda this year before placing third at Amstel Gold – behind only Vollering and Kopecky. She beat Shackley, Realini and Niedermaier to win the inaugural Tour de l’Avenir Femmes in the summer and is still only 21.
Van Anrooij’s Lidl-Trek team have also signed five of the world’s most talented 18-year-olds in the Junior World Champs time-trial winner and runner-up, Australian Felicity Wilson-Haffenden and Britain’s Izzy Sharp, as well as the highly decorated multi-disciplined trio of Canadian twins Ava and Isabella Holmgren and Belgian Fleur Moors, so they’re clearly planning for the future. Speaking of…
The future for women’s cycling
In terms of squad strength and depth women’s cycling has never been in better shape, but 2023 saw several races cancelled and sponsorships fall off.
The Womens’ Tour, Britain’s flagship race, was forced to set up a crowdfunding campaign to secure its place in the calendar this year when it failed to secure a title sponsor or one for three of its four jerseys.
But it still had a shortfall of £400,000 despite this effort and race organisers SweetSpot opted to ‘take a one-year hiatus’ instead.
It’s hoped that this will just be a one-year break rather than a longer-term problem.
But with road races in general struggling for profitability and the much bigger men’s Tour of Britain suffering too there’s no guarantee that women’s cycling will be safe next year from similar issues. British Cycling alleges organiser SweetSpot owes £700,000 in unpaid rights fees, a financial shortfall that would have a drastic impact on its ability to put on both its major races.
Beyond problems of funding for an increasingly professional scene, women’s cycling continues to be dogged by age-old issues of sexism and coverage.
The UCI came under fire at the end of last year for failing to provide TV coverage of the women’s event in its Gravel World Championships. This, despite an all-star field – won by Niewiadoma in her first gravel race – significant hype from fans, and the fact that it did cover the men’s elite race.
Women’s cycling is increasingly professional and going from strength to strength. But when even the governing body can’t secure streaming deals or get behind the sport it shows it still has a long way to go. Let’s hope for better in 2024.
British hopefuls to watch out for
2023 was a bumper year for Britain’s female cyclists, whose ranks have been bolstered by some new additions moving up from the junior circuit. And with the Olympics looming there’s never been a better time to be on Brit-watch…
DSM-Firmenich’s Pfeiffer Georgi was among the very best in the spring Classics, winning her first WorldTour race at Brugge-De Panne and finishing firmly in the mix at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, Paris-Roubaix and Amstel Gold. She capped that off by regaining her British road race title and finishing fourth at the European Championships in September – barely behind SD Worx trio Mischa Bredewold, Vollering and Kopecky – and was in contention until right at the end.
Jumbo-Visma rider Anna Henderson finished eighth in that, attacking along with Georgi, but her highlight was finishing second in the Euro time-trial behind only Reusser. Henderson’s only win of the season was the team time-trial at the Vuelta but she was consistently strong in 2023 with multiple top tens in the Classics and podiums in the GC of both the Baloise Ladies Tour and Simac Ladies Tour.
Former world road race winner Lizzie Deignan returned from the birth of her second child to support her Lidl-Trek team throughout the summer, and had big results herself finishing sixth in the World Championships Road Race and third overall at the RideLondon Classique. She’s another strong contender on women’s cycling’s other super-team if she can get back to her best.
Multi-discipline talent Zoe Bäckstedt will look to build on her first pro season and starry junior results having switched from EF Education-TIBCO-SVB to Canyon-SRAM just in time for the cyclocross season, where she’s looking for her first elite win in Europe this winter. Watch out for her development in the spring, where she’ll have help from team DS, dad Magnus Bäckstedt.
And teenage sensation and junior Tour of Flanders and Trofeo Alfredo Binda winner Cat Ferguson has signed as a stagiaire at Movistar from August 2024 and will move into more senior racing over the course of next season. Aged just 17, she’s another of Britain’s stars of the future.
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