The Women's Tour kicks off in the East
Stage One gets underway from Colchester this morning
The Women's Tour is back in the East for another year, with stage one getting underway in Essex and Suffolk today.
The international women's race is expected to attract thousands of people to the region, with the first two days of racing set to be held here.
Day one starts off in Colchester, with riders setting off from the Sport's Park at 11am, before completing the 142km ride to Bury St Edmunds.
Road Closures
The Women’s Tour operates a rolling road closure system, as opposed to a full road closure, to minimise disruption as much as possible.
Roads along the stage route will only be closed for a short window – approximately 30 minutes – while the race passes through.
The Riders
This year’s race will feature 97 riders across 17 teams, including 13 of the 14 UCI Women’s WorldTour squads.
Among the field will be a pair of former winners: Coryn Labecki (Team Jumbo – Visma) and Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon//SRAM Racing). The latter is once again eyeing victory, having won the 2017 edition and finished second two years later.
Fellow Briton Lizzie Holden (Le Col – Wahoo) is preparing for her third edition of the Women’s Tour, having also raced in the virtual ŠKODA V-Women’s Tour edition held during the first lockdown.
Heading to the Women’s Tour in good form is Team BikeExchange – Jayco rider Alexandra Manley, who won four stages and the overall of the Lotto Thüringen Ladies Tour in Germany last week.
Also lining up will be a number of distinctive jerseys, with European road race champion Ellen van Dijk (Trek – Segafredo) joining the national road race champions of Britain (Pfeiffer Georgi, Team DSM), Israel (Omer Shapira, EF Education – TIBCO – SVB), Italy (Elisa Longo Borghini, Trek – Segafredo), Canada (Alison Jackson, Liv Racing Xstra); Czech Republic (Tereza Neumanova, Liv Racing Xstra) and Austria (Kathrin Schweinberger, CERATIZIT – WNT Pro Cycling).
The second stage of the international race will be held in Harlow tomorrow.