{"id":307374,"date":"2025-07-31T19:45:13","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T19:45:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/307374\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T19:45:13","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T19:45:13","slug":"bonus-seconds-launch-kasia-niewiadoma-phinney-onto-tour-de-france-femmes-gc-podium-in-first-mountain-test","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/307374\/","title":{"rendered":"Bonus seconds launch Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney onto Tour de France Femmes GC podium in first mountain test"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 2024 Tour de France Femmes<\/a> winner, Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney<\/a> (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto), wears the bib number 1 and has the clear goal of winning the race again, with stage 6 bringing the first real mountain test<\/a> for the overall contenders.<\/p>\n

The Polish allrounder was happy to see a selection in the peloton after a couple of chaotic, often crash-marred first stages, and she is hitting her top form with perfect timing ahead of the mountainous final few days of racing.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight now, I\u2019m more mentally tired from being in this crazy peloton than physically from doing all the efforts. It was nice to have a smaller group due to the climbs. I think it was a good stage for us. We tried to stay together as much as possible. I always had teammates around me, so that was perfect,\u201d said Niewiadoma-Phinney after the stage.<\/p>\n

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The 30-year-old finished towards the back of the favourites\u2019 group, crossing the line in 12th place, but she and C\u00e9drine Kerbaol (EF Education-Oatly) had tried to anticipate the faster finishers in Ambert.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s an opportunity for both of us to, like, rip the corners. We always do it, and I knew she was going to go for it. Unfortunately, it was still quite far from the last corner until the finish line. I guess if it was 200 metres, maybe we could have tried something,\u201d Niewiadoma-Phinney explained the unsuccessful attempt to gain time in the final.<\/p>\n

Earlier on the stage, Kerbaol and Niewiadoma-Phinney had showcased their downhill abilities on the descent from the Col du B\u00e9al, but it was too far from the finish to capitalise on the move.<\/p>\n

However, Niewiadoma-Phinney picked up two bonus seconds at the bonus sprint in Valcivi\u00e8res atop the final climb of the day, and this was enough to leapfrog Demi Vollering (FDJ-Suez) in the general classification.<\/p>\n

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She is now third overall, 30 seconds behind yellow jersey Kim Le Court-Pienaar (AG Insurance-Soudal) and one second ahead of Vollering with the three hardest stages of the race still to come. And Niewiadoma-Phinney is hitting peak form just at the right time.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes, it takes a while for your legs to open up. At first, I didn\u2019t feel like I was fresh, but the longer we raced, the better I felt. That\u2019s something that I need to keep in mind for the remaining stages,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Niewiadoma-Phinney\u2019s teammate Ricarda Bauernfeind can see the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think she\u2019s in super good form. I\u2019m sometimes at the back of the group, so I have a good overview of how everyone is looking and how they\u2019re pedalling. And Kasia looks the best, so I\u2019m really looking forward [to the next stages] and hope that we can take the yellow jersey. It definitely gives me some extra motivation to push one minute more,\u201d said Bauernfeind.<\/p>\n

Subscribe to Cyclingnews for unlimited access to our Tour de France Femmes coverage. Don’t miss any of the breaking news, reports, and analysis from one of the biggest women’s stage races of the season. <\/strong>Find out more<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 2024 Tour de France Femmes winner, Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto), wears the bib number 1 and has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4104],"tags":[4230,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-307374","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114949568983443435","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}