Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM) held off a late push by stage 6 winner Cedrine Kerbaol (Sera-Taizit-WNT) to keep the yellow jersey heading into the final two days of the Tour de France femme deciding the winner.

For Niewiadoma, it was a day of safety first and maintaining a lead as the decisive duo of summit finishes loomed, but Kerbaul built a 40-second lead 14.6km before the finish to take the maillot jaune.

However, his teammate Neve Bradbury pulled through, and FDJ-Suez also brought in a rider to reduce the margin of victory to just 21 seconds, allowing the Polish rider to continue leading the race.

“I wasn't feeling too stressed, I had Neve [Bradbury] running with FDJ, so I knew that as we got closer to the finish line, the teams were going to have a harder pace.

Canyon-SRAM was expected to try to expose the missing form of Demi Vollering (SD Works-Protime), who crashed on stage 5 and lost the jersey to Niewiadoma, but the focus was on stages 7 and 8. [Honestly, I think the entire peloton is focused on the last two stages.

“Today was more of a breakaway day, but going into the finals I felt there was a bit of a test between us, with the last climb and Puck [Peeters] going for the mountain points.

The testing moment came on the summit of the Côte des Fices, the final climb, when Niewiadoma pulled away from the trio with Peeters and Vollering.

SD Walkes confirmed that Vollaring, who had suffered mainly superficial injuries in a high-speed crash, had regained his form on the way to Morteau, but Nieuwadema still saw weaknesses in the team's climbing core.

“Of course I think it's a strong team, but in the mountains, as we saw today, Demi only had Niamh Fischer-Black left. [Of course, you can't underestimate Demi. She is a very strong rider and a very smart rider. Without Lotte [Kopecky] and Marlen [Reusser], the team is a bit weaker.

“But they are not just there to watch the race, they are there to win the race. So we are aware of that and we want to compete purely on strength.”

Can Niewiadoma defend the yellow jersey against Vollering and others? Le Grand Bornand and Alpe d'Huez have no place to hide.

Unlimited access to all coverage of the 2024 Tour de France Fam. More info.