SD Wax Pro Time has announced its roster of seven riders for the upcoming Tour de France Femme, with the absolute goal of defending its 2023 title with Demi Vollering.

The Dutchwoman, who plans to leave the team after 2024, leads the GC contenders, while top sprinter Lorena Wiebes will be looking to add to the three stages she has already won in the Tour de France Femme since the inaugural event in 2022.

Joining the two Dutch stars will be European champion Misha Bredewald, Blanca Vas, Niamh Fischer-Black, Barbara Guariski, and Christine Majerus, all of whom will be in the finale at Alpe d'Huez to help Volering The key goal is to help them win the yellow jersey.

Vollering has spent the early summer months at altitude with Bredewald, reconsulting the difficult mountains and getting in great shape for the race, which starts August 12 in her native Netherlands.

"I already did the high altitude training camp pretty close to the Olympics. So I hope I can bring my form to the Olympics, but of course it's difficult," Vollering told Cycling News, describing the difficulty of balancing the Tour with the Olympic road race, where she finished 34th for Weaves on Sunday.

"Normally you would still have a big training week, like last week. But right now I'm not training much because I want to be fresh here. I want to see if I can go into the Tour de France in this shape." [The summit finishes of stages 7 and 8 to the Grand Bornand and Alpe d'Huez are sure to be the final decisive battleground in the battle for yellow.

"This year, especially the last two days are super, super hard. The course is really hard, especially the last two days," she said.

Vives' ambitions on the flat stages are noteworthy, especially given that she is a strong candidate to win yellow in Rotterdam for the Dutch team SD Walks, but the team stressed that yellow with Voerling is the ultimate goal. in 2023. The green jersey, won with Lotte Kopecký (who prioritizes Olympic track events over the Tour), is also a priority after the maillot jaune.

"If she [Wiebes] wins at home, she will get the first yellow jersey. But we're not going to waste any effort defending that jersey," said sport manager Danny Stamm. Our priority is to win the final race. So the green jersey will not be our focus anytime soon."

"Eyes will be on us, but we're used to that. We had a great performance last year and we want to make this year's race as colorful and hard as possible

"Demi is counting on a selection that is giving its all to win the Tour for the second year in a row. To win the yellow jersey in the Alpe d'Huez. That is our focus."

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