Commentator convinced about Pauline Ferrand-Prévot's Tour bid after impressive Roubaix display: "God forbid what’s going to happen at the Tour de France"

Absolutely mind-wobbling. Pauline Ferrand-Prévot crashed on one of the decisive cobbled sectors on her Hell of the North debut, but later caught up with the front and ultimately drove everyone off her wheel. Who would've thought that the French woman who aims for Tour de France Femmes title would go on to win the race considered a polar opposite of Grande Boucle - the Paris-Roubaix Femmes.

"What a display, absolutely magnificent," Matt Stephens said on TNT Sports' The Gruppetto with Rob Hatch. "It was a performance for the ages. God forbid what’s going to happen at the Tour de France if she continues this vein of form."

Stephens added already to have a home winner at Paris-Roubaix after nearly three decades is going to drive the crowds crazy: "The last French winner was [Frederic] Guesdon back in 1997 for the men, so France, as a cycling nation, needed something like this as well, so it was a special, special victory."

Questioned whether he thinks she can win the Tour de France, Stephens replied: "Yes, I do. I don’t know what her numbers were on the flat, but if she was outriding multiple riders behind, riding in a group on flat roads, and she's about 54kg, give or take, you’ve just got to transpose that over onto a climb. She is going to be hard to beat, I think, I really do."

Ferrand-Prevot, who rejoined the road peloton in 2025 following a decade away from the discipline, said after the race that winning the Tour de France Femmes remains her "main goal", the goal she declared before joining Team Visma | Lease a Bike ahead of the season. "I really want to be 100% for the Tour de France. And I want to try to win the Tour de France within three years," she said. "We are building something very strong together as a team."