"Team management did not fully support her in that infamous fifth stage" - Thijs Zonneveld slams SD Worx after Demi Vollering loses Tour de France Femmes by 4 seconds

Demi Vollering came incredibly close to a second successive Maillot Jaune win at the Tour de France Femmes on Sunday afternoon. After a thrilling conclusion to the 2024 edition however, the Dutchwoman lost out to Katarzyna Niewiadoma by just 4 seconds overall.

With such a small margin deciding the race, many are looking back to Vollering's late crash on stage 5, where she lost over a minute and the Maillot Jaune. Most questionable though, was the lack of desire to help from her Team SD Worx - Protime teammates, something noted by ex-pro turned cycling pundit Thijs Zonneveld.

"Lorena Wiebes had seen 'something yellow' lying there when she looked back. She said it as if it were a banana, or Spongebob Squarepants, lying there on the asphalt. But that yellow was the leader in the race, her own teammate, the big favorite to win this Tour: Demi Vollering. It didn't occur to her to stop or wait," Zonneveld recalls for Algemeen Dagblad. "The team management didn't mind either. They would have preferred her to sprint to a great eighth place."

"It turned out, in retrospect, to be the stage in which the 2024 Tour des Femmes was decided. A silly crash cost Vollering almost two minutes. Where other teams reacted immediately and had domestiques wait, the team management of SD/Worx decided to let Blanka Vas and Lorena Wiebes race for their own chance," the expert continues in disbelief. "Because 'you can close that much in a few kilometres'. And the Tour would not be decided by a handful of seconds, right?"

Zonneveld also thinks he knows the reason for the lack of desire to assist Vollering's quest for yellow. "It was certainly not the first time this year that Vollering was virtually on her own. She is not exactly being thanked for leaving Team SD Worx - Protime," he muses. "You see it in the race. Time and time again. At SD/Worx they bet on multiple horses - and preferably on the horses that will still be in their own stable next year. If only because the team management did not fully support her in that infamous fifth stage. Bye yellow, bye Tour. And that for an eighth place for Lorena Wiebes. My mistake, thank you."