Lorena Wiebes wins chaotic bunch sprint as Demi Vollering suffers late crash on Stage 3 of 2025 Tour de France Femmes

Vollering (FDJ-Suez) and Elisa Balsamo (Lidl-Trek) were amongst the riders who tumbled to the ground with less than 4km remaining of the race, as yellow jersey Kimberley Le Court (AG Insurance-Soudal) was also caught up in the bunch.

After two days of racing in the region of Brittany, it was a day advertised for the sprinters, with a largely straightforward day on the cards during the 163.5km route as Le Court became the first African rider to don the maillot jaune at the race.

After a series of early attacks from the bunch once the flag was dropped to indicate the beginning of racing, the day’s breakaway would shortly form, consisting of the quartet of Alison Jackson (EF Education-Oatly), Sara Martin (Movistar), Clemence Latimer (Arkea-B&B Hotels) and Catalina Anais Soto (Laboral Kutxa-Fundacion Euskadi) with 150km to go.

A cat. 4 climb with 129.4km from the finish would cause little disruption, with Jackson picking up the maximum two points and Garcia picking up the single point, as Elise Chabbey (FDJ-SUEZ) would see her 10-point tally unchallenged over the course of the day.

The SD Worx-Protime-controlled peloton would keep the gap to the leaders down to 4’00” for much of the day, with the quartet seeing their advantage gradually vanish over the course of the closing 40km as the intermediate sprint approached.

Whilst the breakaway would take the maximum points as they rolled over the line, it was Wiebes and Vos who would go head-to-head in a foreshadowing of the final outcome, with Wiebes pipping the veteran to the line by a bike length to take 13 points.

A brief touch of wheels saw a split in the bunch shortly after, as Cofidis’ Eugenia Bujak would hit the ground with the Slovenian appearing to be in some discomfort, although she was eventually able to continue.

The peloton would get their first sighting of the breakaway quartet with 15km to go, as the combination of SD Worx and Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto worked to bring the gap down to under a minute.

It was at this point that Martin would attack as the hopes for the breakaway began to fade, with Jackson and Soto able to follow, with Soto putting in her own dig with 7.5km to go.

The breakaway would eventually be caught with 6km to go, as the peloton began a tricky, technical route through the city of Angers, facing numerous roundabouts, narrow roads and rail tracks.

It was there, during a narrowing as the riders crossed the river Maine, which would see Vollering and Balsamo hit the deck, with the yellow jersey Le Court also caught up, as the peloton was split and a group of 20 escaped unharmed.

FDJ’s Marie Le Net would lead the bunch onto the final stretch, with EF Education-Oatly’s Noemi Ruegg deciding to go from 450m out and essentially leading out the reduced bunch sprint, with Wiebes opening up her sprint with 200m to go.

Proving to be the fastest woman in the peloton, Wiebes held off Vos with ease to control the sprint and win by a bike length and pick pick up her first win of the 2025 edition of the Tour.

Vos would pick up six bonus seconds on the line, seeing her move back into the yellow jersey after Le Court’s historic day in the leader’s jersey.

A strung-out peleton would finish over the course of seven minutes, with Vollering crossing with her team-mates’ help over six minutes down – although her GC hopes remained intact with the 5km sprint zone taking effect.

Speaking following her fourth victory in the Tour de France Femmes, Wiebes praised the leadout of Kopecky as she prepared for another head-to-head against Vos in Stage 4.

“I can trust Lotte [Kopecky] fully and that makes it really good because I can focus on her wheel and I know she will deliver me in a good way and to be honest, I couldn’t wait to start my sprint,” she said. “I was so excited that I might have started a bit too early but it was good.

“I knew from the Giro that Marianne could stay on my wheel, I knew to keep an eye on her and I learnt that I need to look to the left and right side to see her.

“We go again for tomorrow. The team did so good today to control the breakaway the whole stage and I hope they will recover a bit for tomorrow as it will be a hard day for them and for us.

Wiebes moves into the points jersey as she holds an 18-point lead over Vos, with another opportunity for the sprinters as the riders make the 130km journey from Saumur to the city of Poitiers.