We shouldn’t be doing this in 2018. It’s so silly to still be fighting for equality.
But, we want to show the rest of the world that women can ride the Tour de France and women can finish it. We want a Tour de France for women, the same as the men have.
That’s why I was part of a group of 13 women who rode the entire Tour de France, a day ahead of the official race this year. It’s the fourth year we’ve done this and it’s the first year we’ve received this kind of attention from around the world. It’s been amazing how much media attention we’ve gotten…from England, United States, Spain…people have contacted us from around the world to hear more about our project.
Skoda UK was a partner to us this year and that made a huge impact on the media and communication. That’s a big reason why so many people have recognized our project. We’re on a good path and hopefully, it won’t take so long to have an official women’s Tour de France.
There is no difference between men and women’s cycling. It’s the same emotion and the same effort. And there’s no reason to prefer one or the other.
I have a PhD in sports science, doing research on fatigue in endurance cyclists. We have a lot of data to support that there is very little difference between men and women. Of course, men have a different anatomy and physiology, but the only difference is that the stage distances should be different. But there is no other reason to show that women can’t have the same opportunities. We are physically capable, and we’ve proven that in more difficult conditions this year.
I sleep less than the rest of the world and have no social life, but I’ve been training really hard with a fulltime job. I trained for one year for this, 300-400 kilometres a week with gym sessions. On the weekends, I did 100 – 150 kilometres rides to prepare. At Donnons des elles au vélo, we all have our own jobs. We work 8 hours a day. We don’t get paid to ride our bikes. We’re just fighting for equality.
The goal of our group is to gain exposure so that the women’s professional peloton can have a women’s Tour de France as soon as possible: one with the same conditions as the men and the same media coverage. We’re not saying the stage distances should be the same, maybe it’s a little shorter and the race is two weeks but we want a women’s Tour de France.
One of the biggest things that surprised me this year was the number of people during the stages that followed us and rode with us. On some stages, we had 200-300 riders. We didn’t have road closure, so we had to stop at every traffic light. It took a lot of time when there were so many of us. Some people stayed with us for 2 or 3 stages. It was so great.
There was one stage where we found a group of men dressed as women. They were also riding the Tour one day ahead of the official race, like us. Everyone thought they were us when they came past. They decided to ride the Tour de France dressed as women, riding in support of us. Usually, the last three years, supporters would say to us, “Go, go, guys!” and we’d have to say, no, we’re not guys, we are women. This year it was the opposite. That’s was so funny when we saw that.
Mentally the ride was very hard, especially the later stages but the support we got from everyone helped us finish this incredible journey. We have some people helping us with logistics but obviously, it’s not comparable to what the men’s teams had in the race.
Some of the men, like Warren Barguil, are good partners of our project and have given us great support. FDJ is one of the sponsors of the project and that gives us a lot of hope.
So many people have told us how we have their support and that’s given us a little of optimism. This year, we made a change. But again, it’s 2018, we shouldn’t have to be doing this.
