Women’s Tour Down Under

The Women's Tour Down Under, run as the Santos Women's Tour Down Under after its naming sponsor, is a three-day WorldTour cycling stage race held in South Australia each January. First held as a UCI stage race in 2016, it opens the women's professional calendar and has grown into a key early-season target for climbers and all-rounders.

The Women’s Tour Down Under is a stage race around Adelaide and the hills above the city, held in the South Australian summer each January. It joined the Women’s WorldTour in 2023, and its first four editions at that level were decided on Corkscrew Road or Willunga Hill.

When did the Women’s Tour Down Under begin?

The race was first run in 2016, when the UCI put it on the international calendar. Before that, the women’s program in Adelaide was a handful of criteriums held while the men’s Tour Down Under was in town. The 2016 peloton mixed seasoned professionals with riders from domestic teams who fitted their training around jobs and study.

Tiffany Cromwell remembers how hard the women’s race once was to find. “I remember in the early years, it was like we would have a women's tour, then they'd put us somewhere where you couldn't even find us off the main street,” she told Cyclingnews in 2026. That January all 14 Women’s WorldTour teams started the race for the first time.

How Katrin Garfoot won the 2016 Santos Women’s Tour

The first edition had four stages and was settled on the last of them, a circuit race in Victoria Park in Adelaide. Katrin Garfoot started that stage level on time with Lauren Kitchen, Shelley Olds and Dani King, so the race would go to whichever of the four finished highest. Garfoot was the Australian time trial champion and had no reputation as a sprinter.

Kimberley Wells won the sprint from Annette Edmondson, and Garfoot finished third, ahead of her three rivals, to take the overall title. Her Orica-AIS teammate Lizzie Williams led her out after the rider she had been following was boxed in.

Amanda Spratt’s three wins in a row

Amanda Spratt won the next three editions, in 2017, 2018 and 2019. During that run, in 2018, the race moved up from UCI class 2.2 to 2.1. The same year the organizer made the prize money equal for the women’s and men’s races.

Ruth Winder ended Spratt’s streak in 2020. The international race was not held in 2021 or 2022 because of the pandemic, and South Australia ran the domestic Santos Festival of Cycling in its place.

Grace Brown catches Spratt after Corkscrew Road in 2023

The 2023 edition was the first Women's WorldTour stage race in the southern hemisphere. It was decided on the last climb of the last stage, Corkscrew Road in the Adelaide Hills, which is followed by a descent to the finish in Campbelltown. Grace Brown started the day six seconds ahead of Spratt overall, after collecting five bonus seconds at intermediate sprints on the first two stages. Spratt attacked 1.5 kilometers from the top and crossed the summit 20 seconds ahead of her.

Brown chased for nearly seven kilometers and caught Spratt as they entered the final kilometer. She then beat her in the sprint and won both the stage and the race. “I knew that Amanda was going to be really good on the Corkscrew, but I just kept her within distance knowing that I could potentially catch her back on the descent, and I was able to do it,” Brown said.

Sarah Gigante wins on Willunga Hill in 2024

The women’s race climbed Willunga Hill for the first time in 2024, when the final stage finished at the top. Sarah Gigante had won there before, at the Santos Festival of Cycling in 2021. She watched the replay of that ride the afternoon before the stage.

She had barely raced internationally in the previous year, and this was her first race for AG Insurance-Soudal. Crosswinds on the way to the climb dropped her from the peloton for a time, and she spent energy getting back. At the foot of Willunga she attacked with 2.8 kilometers to go, accelerated again 500 meters later and rode the rest alone.

“Originally the team was saying maybe I should go later, go where Richie [Porte] goes but I said no, I want to go from the bottom and I believed that I could do it,” she said. She won the stage by 16 seconds from the 19-year-old Nienke Vinke and the race by 20 seconds.

Noemi Rüegg’s two titles, 2025 and 2026

In 2025 Willunga came on the second of the three stages, and Noemi Rüegg dropped Silke Smulders on its upper slopes to win there and take the ochre jersey by 15 seconds. She had nearly lost time the day before, when a mechanical problem struck three kilometers from the finish. Her teammate Henrietta Christie handled a quick bike change, the team brought her back to the bunch and she finished sixth. On the last stage, in Stirling, she had to close the gaps herself and still finished third in the sprint. It was the first overall WorldTour title for EF Education-Oatly.

The 2026 route left Willunga Hill out and sent the final stage twice over Corkscrew Road before the descent to Campbelltown. Ally Wollaston had won the first two stages and led the race, and she was dropped almost as soon as the first ascent began. On the second ascent Rüegg rode across to Dominika Włodarczyk, and Mavi García and Paula Blasi came with her, which left her alone with three UAE Team ADQ riders.

She had to follow every move on the descent to Campbelltown, and then she won the sprint. “I knew they would attack me; it was the only chance they had. I just had to follow immediately; I knew I had a good sprint,” she said. Rüegg was the first rider to win the race two years running since Spratt. Spratt, 38 and in her final season, had attacked on that last climb too.

This is where the women's season begins. While the northern hemisphere is deep in winter, the peloton gathers in Adelaide for three days of racing through wine country and the hills east of the city. The race has launched breakout seasons, rewarded January sharpness, and produced a winner list that includes Grace Brown, Sarah Gigante, and Amanda Spratt's remarkable three-peat. The heat, the short climbs, and the unpredictability of early-season form make it more open than many January races have a right to be.