For decades, men ran the show in sports. They controlled federations, made the rules, and decided what counted. Women? Often sidelined. Even when they demanded space, they were ignored. Gone are the days when cycling was dismissed as a “fertility threat” for women. Now, in 2025, the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift took place from 26 July to 3 August, and it just felt like a golden era.

But to understand how we got here, we need to rewind and remember the fight.

• 1955: First women’s Tour de France-style stage race
  Winner: Millie Robinson

• 2022: Revival of the modern Tour de France Femmes
  Winner: Annemiek van Vleuten

Between 1955 and 2022? It wasn’t easy peasy. Petitions were shut down. Races were canceled. And women kept fighting. Let’s rewind and see how it all began.

The long ride to recognition for the Tour de France Femmes 2025

✅The first women’s Tour de France-style race happened in 1955, led by journalist Jean Leulliot. It was a one-off and disappeared without media support.

✅In 1984, the Tour de France Féminin launched alongside the men’s race but ended in 1989 due to poor funding.

✅From 1990-2009, fragmented races like the Tour of the EEC Women and Grande Boucle Féminine Internationale tried to fill the gap but struggled with resources and visibility.

✅In 2013, a petition led by Kathryn Bertine, Marianne Vos, Emma Pooley, and Chrissie Wellington gained over 97,000 signatures, demanding a proper women’s Tour.

✅ASO responded with La Course in 2014, a one-day race on the Champs-Élysées, a symbolic but limited gesture.

✅Finally, in 2022, ASO launched the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift.

Here we are: 2025. “It feels like we’re entering a golden era for women’s cycling.” That’s what Zwift called it. And they weren’t wrong.

The Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift 2025, held in Brittany, France, was fiercer, longer, and tougher than ever before: 9 stages, 1,168.6 km, and 17,240 meters of climbing.

Highlights?

• Stage 1: Vannes → Plumelec

• Stage 8: Chambery to Col de la Madeleine

• Stage 9: Thonon-les-Bains → Chatel

• And when the dust settled? Pauline Ferrand-Prevot stood on top. 3 minutes and 42 seconds clear. She made history as the first French woman to win it since 1989 (Jeannie Longo). Before the Tour, she won Olympic gold in mountain biking (2024) and also captured Paris–Roubaix Femmes in April 2025, making her the first woman ever to win both in a single season..

But the story didn’t stop on the road. This was the most-watched edition yet:

• Broadcast in 190 countries

• 80+ million viewing hours across Europe (2024)

• 2.7 million average viewers per stage in France — up 500K from 2024

• 25.7 million unique French viewers across the nine stages – 7.4 million more than last year

• Stage 8 alone: 4.4 million average viewers, peaking at 7.7 million with a massive 41.2% audience share

All trending upward. Fast. But this boom didn’t start in 2025.

A tour that raised the bar

The momentum had already kicked in back in 2024.

Engagement soared. So did fan demand. But not everything kept up.

Despite record demand, global coverage still fell short.

Tour de France Femmes soars, but many still can’t watch

In the UK, fans hit paywalls on TNT Sports (Discovery+), making live-stage access difficult.
In the US, most coverage was hidden behind Peacock, FloBikes, or HBO Max, with many viewers complaining about endless ads, bad commentary, and glitchy streams.

Zwift’s fan survey said it all: 36% of U.S. fans, 18% of U.K. fans…wanted to watch, but couldn’t. It simply wasn’t available where they were.  But the race wasn’t accessible even as global interest peaked. And it wasn’t just a viewing problem.

While marquee races thrived, smaller WorldTour events suffered.

• Tour of Scandinavia — Cancelled (no sponsors).
•  Thuringen Ladies Tour — Cancelled (€200K in funding cut).
•  Bretagne Ladies Tour — Cancelled (short €37K).

Growth is real. But access and equity still lag behind.

Since the UCI introduced minimum salaries in 2020, women’s pro cycling has seen steady gains:

• €15,000 → €31,768 for employed riders by 2025

• €62,320 minimum for self-employed pros

• €40,000 average salary (Zwift, 2025)

• 15% now earn over €100K

Top stars? Earning up to €300K–€500K annually. Even neo-pros are landing six-figure deals.

Team budgets have nearly doubled from €2.35M (2022) to €4.67M (2025). And with the UCI’s new ProTeam tier, a broader pro base is finally taking shape. But who’s investing?

• Zwift: Title sponsor since 2022

• Nike: Rider + team sponsorships.

• NTT Data: Official tech partner, powering race data + broadcasts.

It’s not parity yet, but it’s real, visible progress.

The Tour de France Femmes showed us what we’ve known all along: when people can actually watch women’s cycling, it delivers. The energy, the talent, the fans, it’s all there. Now the real question is: will the coverage, pay, and support stick around all year, not just for one big race? It should.