Tour de France Femmes 2025 stage 6 preview – The mountains of the Massif Central a major proving ground in the battle for yellow

We've left the chaos and the hills of Brittany behind, and the sprint showdowns between Lorena Wiebes and Marianne Vos are consigned to history… Now, it's time for the Tour de France Femmes to hit the mountains.

Stage 6 of the 2025 Tour sets off from Clermont-Ferrand, host of the 2023 Tour's Grand Départ and home of Rémi Cavagna, before tackling four classified climbs, including the little-visited Col du Béal. The stage concludes in Ambért, a small town in Puy-de-Dôme with no major connection to professional cycling, although Ceratizit rider Dilyxine Miermont is a local.

Along the way stands 2,475 metres of climbing in the Massif Central, France's third mountain range. It's the most of any stage of the race to date, but a number dwarfed by those of the final two stages in the Alps. It's not the toughest day of the Tour, though it's far from the easiest.

A largely flat opening 30km ends with a hilltop intermediate sprint and another chance for Wiebes and Vos to face off, but that initial segment of the stage is really the only flat ground the peloton will see all day.

A pair of third-category climbs follow the sprint at Sermentizon in quick succession. The Côte de Courpière (1.7km at 6.8%) and Côte d'Augerolles (2.6km at 5.6%) resemble climbs that have generated gaps and decided stages earlier in the race. However, here they serve as apéritifs – or perhaps springboards for breakaway attackers if a move hasn't already gone.

After passing through Olliergues after 55km, the road heads upwards (around 15km at 2.7%) to the first-category Col du Béal, a climb last seen five years ago in the men's Tour.

There, the 10.2km, 5.6% mountain featured early on a stage to Lyon, while back at the 2014 Critérium du Dauphiné, it hosted a showdown between Chris Froome and Alberto Contador. The women's peloton will crest the climb for the first time with 44.5km to go on Thursday afternoon.

Will it be too far out for any hopefuls to push hard? Maybe, considering the Alps lie in the near future. A twisting descent through the Auvergne wilds poses another challenge, especially to tired legs after a fast-paced opening five days.

From there, it's back uphill again for the second-category Col du Chansert (6.5km at 5.5%) and a very winding and technical 9km descent. The Chansert is the final classified climb of the day, but it's not the last chance to make a difference, lying as it does 29km from the line.

Instead, another challenge lies between the riders and the finish in the shape of the 4.5km uphill run to Valcivières, with another sprint offering six, four and two seconds coming at the top of the 5.3% hill.

12.1km will then separate the quickest to the top from triumph at the finish line, with the remainder of the stage split between a short spell at the plateau and another dive down into the valley.

The favourites for the stage announced themselves on Wednesday as seven potential contenders pulled clear of the pack on the hilly road to Guerét. The top climbers of last year's race, Demi Vollering (FDJ-Suez) and Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney (Canyon-Sram Zondacypto), will certainly be among the elites on stage 6.

The likes of Kim Le Court-Pienaar (AG Insurance-Soudal), Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime), and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot (Visma-Lease A Bike) have shown they can climb the smaller hills as well as anyone so far, but will they match Vollering and Niewiadoma-Phinney on an ascent such as the Béal?

Elsewhere, Sarah Gigante (AG Insurance-Soudal) and Pauliena Rooijakkers (Fenix-Deceuninck) are great going uphill but will do well to be at the front on the tricky descents. And then there are the likes of Puck Pieterse (Fenix-Deceuninck), Cédrine Kerbaol (EF Education-Oatly), and Niam Fisher-Black (Lidl-Trek), who will want to show they're still in the GC fight.

At the end of stage 5, the third punchy stage of the Tour with three short climbs packed into the final 40km, multiple riders – including Niewiadoma-Phinney – mentioned their surprise at how selective it had been.

Tiredness might be the answer, following several hectic and fast-paced days of racing in which riders have had to focus all day and endlessly battle for position. If so, the women of the Tour peloton won't be any fresher on Thursday, and a day that isn't the queen stage of the race may end up being even tougher than it already looks.

One thing that won't add to the riders' worries, though, is the weather. The stage is set to be run under mostly sunny skies with some clouds at temperatures in the low-to-mid 20s.

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Mountains

• Côte de Courpière (1.7km at 6.8%), cat. 3, 37km
• Côte d'Augerolles (2.6km at 5.6%), cat. 3, 45.7km
• Col du Béal (10km at 5.6%), cat. 1, 79.2km
• Col du Chansert (6.3km at 5.5%), cat. 2, 94.7km

Sprints

• Sermentizon, 30.1km
• Valcivières (bonus), 111.6km