Opinion: Annemiek van Vleuten, Demi Vollering, Elisa Longo Borghini favourites on big mountains on Stage 7

Tomorrow women’s racing enters uncharted territory. The three category 1 climbs on Stage 7 of Tour de France Femmes comprise 29.9km (almost a quarter) of the 127.1km, for a total of more than 3000m of ascent. All of it comes in the final 90km.

All after six stages and 782.7km of the most demanding racing many – if not all – of the riders have ever faced.

It has been designed to be this hard, to push the envelope, to raise the bar and find out who can clear it. Some will. Some won’t. Next year more should be able to.

Starting with Le Petit Ballon, ending with Le Grand, there will be gaps. Riders will struggle for dear life to hang on. The time limit will be the toughest foe some of them will face all week. Few will be in a position to actually ‘race’.

Those that can will be counted on the fingers of one hand.

They will be two Dutch riders and an Italian. Maybe, at a push, a Frenchwoman. Juliette Labous, though, as rapidly as she is developing, and as impressive it was for her to be the sole survivor on the Passo Maniva a month ago, is realistically not ready to contest such a stage.

What seems likely is that it will be between Annemiek van Vleuten (Movistar), Demi Vollering (SD Worx) and Elisa Longo Borghini (Trek-Segafredo). One of those riders will likely take not only the stage victory but also pole position ahead of the Super Planche Des Belles Filles on Sunday.

Only the Italian can honestly say she is where she would hope to be at this point in proceedings. Even ELB will probably be wondering if her GC advantage (53 seconds over Van Vleuten, 36 on Vollering) could not be more.

Could Trek-Segafredo, with the strength of their squad, have exploited a weakened Van Vleuten early on in the week? Was it a mistake to invest so much in stage wins that were – at least in retrospect – unlikely to come off? Was the bird in the hand really worth more for SD Worx, who won Stage 4 with Marlen Reusser, than a possible two in the bush?

In contrast Van Vleuten, after her gastrointestinal ordeal early in the race, will count herself lucky not to be multiple minutes in arrears.

Especially now she has, in the words of Eurosport’s Orla Chennaoui, “her naughty little twinkle back.”

That same twinkle has been interpreted as a hint that the Giro Donne champion is back to her best (or at least feels like she is).

Yet even having recovered from it, the illness ought to have weakened her to the point where she is beatable. Even as they would publicly profess otherwise, Longo Borghini and Vollering will be privately hoping that is the case.

They will be hoping that the playing field has been somewhat levelled. They will hope her ability to ride away from them is less. They may be considering – temporarily at least – engaging an alliance between the stronger teams of SD Worx and Trek-Segafredo. They can send riders up the road and do no chasing. Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio, fifth and 1’05 down on yellow jersey Marianne Vos, is a massive card to play for Vollering.

We are not at the point of progression in women’s cycling where the margins are (necessarily) fine. On multiple 30-minute climbs they might be enormous.

While we would not wish for the best rider in the world to not be able to perform at her peak, the truth is that a competitive Tour de France (Femmes ou Hommes) is preferable to a domination by a single rider. So far, that is what we have seen, and long may it continue.

By holding Van Vleuten in deficit, Longo Borghini and Vollering know they can play it relatively defensively. Van Vleuten needs to attack and attack she surely will. Not necessarily tomorrow, but sometime, at some point, between now and the summit of La Planche Des Belles Filles on Sunday.

To paraphrase the old, somewhat irony-loaded phrase, the real Tour de France Femmes starts tomorrow.