Tour de France Femmes; “Empty, sour, proud,” Demi Vollering loses by four seconds

“Empty, sour, proud,” said the Dutch cyclist Demi Vollering about her feelings after losing to the Polish Kasia Niewiadoma by four seconds in the final Tour de France Femmes.

Tour de France Femmes; Vollering´s loss

“Une montagne d´emotions,” the mountain of emotions, Alpe d´Huez saw tears of loss and victory on August 17, as Kasia Niewiadoma and Demi Vollering committed themselves completely to cycling 150 km with 3,900 metres on the Alpe d´Huez and Col de Glandon.

One minute, one second of the cycling race left Demi Vollering in tears, as a crash lost her the jersey, making her miss out on four bonus seconds, losing to Kasia Niewiadoma by the narrowest margin in the history of either the women´s or men´s Tour de France race.

Vollering confessed after the exceptionally tense race; “I feel really empty after today´s effort but of course, also I´m a bit disappointed that I couldn´t win the yellow jersey by just four seconds, that´s a bit sour for me at the moment.”

Heartbroken, she reflected on the “what ifs,” of the past; “If I would jump on the bike a little bit earlier. If I would win in Liege from Puck. If yesterday I attacked a bit earlier. There are so many ifs but you don´t buy anything from ifs so I can think very long about that but it only makes me sad.”

Tour de France Femmes; Niewiadoma´s victory

The 27-year-old Dutch cyclist wasn´t the only one in tears, but Kasia Niewiadoma´s tears were those of joyous victory. The Polish winner said to the Press; “Four seconds seem to be magical now. Throughout my whole career, there were so many times I missed out on victories. I feel like this week was perfect for me and my team. To be able to win big races, you need everything on your side.”

Niewiadoma had previously described the final stage of the Tour de France as “the most important day of my career and maybe, my team´s existence.” The 29-year-old champion had now claimed her 18th victory, which she attributed not only to her hard work but also the “stars” which were “aligned” on her side, highlighting; “We all wrote history this week.”