Jean-Marc, my driver, insisted that he was a total professional and that my safety was his priority. Only it soon became apparent that he was more of an adrenaline junkie who seemed perfectly suited to bombing up and down the hilliest stage of the Tour de France Femmes. A nightmare scenario for someone who had never ridden a motorcycle.
Still, I’d never say no to a Saturday afternoon alongside the women’s peloton as it navigated an energy-guzzling penultimate stage of the Tour de France Femmes in the heart of the Vosges – especially if it meant getting to see the woman’s up close multiple times.
Annemiek van Vleuten, the Dutch climbing queen of cycling, was hindered earlier this week by a stomach flu and even had to go to the toilet during the third stage on Tuesday. “Things were really, really tricky,” she said. “The most important thing was finding a good place to ‘go’ on the side of the road.” Under UCI rules, Van Vleuten was fined 100 Swiss francs for making her improvised toilet stop.
Seeing the women’s peloton up close made me wonder how cycling rules are still skewed towards female riders. What if one of them had their period and had to change their tampon halfway through the race? What fine would that result in according to the UCI regulations?
Before the race started in Selestat, Jean-Marc talked me through his own unofficial rules for riding as a duo in the Tour de France. A quick tap on the left knee meant danger lay ahead, like going over a bump in the road, or the unlikely event that a rider crossed us and I had to brace myself. Halfway through our three and a half hour drive, he innocently asked if I’d been to the bathroom. I told him I didn’t feel like doing a Van Vleuten.
The woman stayed in the saddle herself during the grueling 127 kilometer mountain stage that meandered through the breathtaking Alsace wine region from Selestat to Le Markstein Fellering.
There were countless times when we got close to the Olympic time trial champion in Tokyo and she was clearly in her element and barely sweating. She looked mad as she pulled away from Demi Vollering on the Col de Platzerwasel, which was no small obstacle at 7.1 kilometers with an 8.3 percent gradient. It was exhausting just swinging up the climb with Jean-Marc, who clearly got a kick out of cornering at breakneck speeds in an attempt to show off the locals.
At the top, we dismounted and watched the remaining riders drag it to the top. I stood next to Gabrielle, an 81-year-old local woman who had decided to bring her seven grandchildren, all dressed for the occasion in large red polka-dot shirts, to watch. “I’ve never seen the Men’s Tour,” she told me, “but I couldn’t miss the women. It is important that they know that France is behind them.”
That has been the predominant message of the past week. Each day, locals have walked the route in their hundreds, if not thousands, in the larger villages the race passed through. On Saturday, men, women and children, young and old, were represented, some dressed up, others turned it into a full family celebration with their caravans. Jean-Marc happily pointed to the three young men who had climbed into a bale of a tractor to get a better vantage point.
It wasn’t until we reached the top of Le Grand Ballon – the final climb of the day, which at 1,424 meters is the highest peak in the Vosges – that I decided it was safe to grab my cellphone to capture some content. No sooner had I pulled out my phone than we were racing down the descent, at a speed of 120 km/h. It was easier to enjoy the smaller details that went up.
“Girls just want basic rights,” a banner along the route read, the letters all cut out individually and hung on a makeshift clothesline. For so long, the Tour de France was an event exclusively reserved for men, a right that women have always been denied.
Based on how successful this inaugural Tour de France Femmes has been, you have to wonder why it took so long.