UAE Tour Women

The UAE Tour Women is a four-day WorldTour cycling stage race held each February in the United Arab Emirates. First run in 2023, it is the only Women's WorldTour race in the Middle East, blending flat desert and city stages with a decisive summit finish on Jebel Hafeet, near Al Ain.

The UAE Tour Women is a four-stage WorldTour race held in the United Arab Emirates each February, with three flat stages for the sprinters and one finish on Jebel Hafeet. Elisa Longo Borghini won three of its first four editions, in 2023, 2025 and 2026, and Lotte Kopecky won the other.

When did the UAE Tour Women begin?

The first edition ran from February 9 to 12, 2023, and went from Dubai to Abu Dhabi. The organizer presented it as the first Women's WorldTour race in the Middle East. Stages 1, 2 and 4 were for the sprinters, and stage 3 finished at the top of Jebel Hafeet, the mountain outside Al Ain.

Jebel Hafeet is 10.8 kilometers long and gains 928 meters. Much of it is steeper than 8 percent, and the hardest ramp, at 11 percent, comes three kilometers from the finish. The climb came on the third stage in 2023, 2024 and 2025 and on the fourth and last in 2026.

Longo Borghini and Realini hand in hand in 2023

On the first ascent, in 2023, the group shrank over the last 10 kilometers until only two Trek-Segafredo riders were left: Longo Borghini and Gaia Realini, who was 21. They crossed the line hand in hand, with Longo Borghini just in front. Silvia Persico was third on the stage, 1 minute 11 seconds behind them.

The next day Charlotte Kool won the sprint on the Abu Dhabi Breakwater, her second stage of the race. Longo Borghini won the first overall title by seven seconds from Realini, with Persico third at 1 minute 18 seconds.

How Lotte Kopecky won on Jebel Hafeet in 2024

Kopecky came to the 2024 race as world champion and had never won a stage that finished at a summit. Longo Borghini, the defending champion, was the first of the favorites to drop back, six kilometers from the top. Neve Bradbury attacked with 2.9 kilometers to go, and Kopecky led the pursuit ahead of Mavi García and Realini.

Kopecky closed the gap gradually and reached Bradbury 600 meters from the line. She went straight to the front, sprinted clear in the last 200 meters and took the stage and the race lead, with García third at 31 seconds. “When the Canyon girl went, I was in a bit of a panic but I could find my rhythm. I came closer again and it looked like I could make it,” she said. She kept the red jersey on the last stage, where Amber Kraak won from a breakaway with the sprinters on her wheel.

How crosswinds decided the 2025 UAE Tour Women

The flat stages cross open desert, and the wind has split them more than once. On stage 2 in 2023 Marta Cavalli, one of the favorites, lost time when the race broke up in crosswinds in the last 10 kilometers. Two years later Longo Borghini, by then riding for UAE Team ADQ, used the wind herself.

On stage 2 of the 2025 race she formed an echelon in the first few kilometers with her teammates Karlijn Swinkels and Lara Gillespie, Lorena Wiebes and Lily Williams. The five stayed in front all day, and the three UAE riders kept riding to the finish to gain time for their leader. Wiebes won the stage, and a peloton of about 30 that held most of the other favorites arrived 1 minute 26 seconds later.

On Jebel Hafeet the next day Persico, now her teammate, set a pace that cut the front group to nine riders and dropped Wiebes, the race leader. Longo Borghini won the stage by 35 seconds from Persico. “We can call it a masterpiece from UAE Team ADQ,” she said at the finish. She called it the team’s first victory on home soil, and she finished the race 2 minutes 6 seconds ahead of Persico.

Longo Borghini’s third win in 2026

In 2026 the mountain decided the race on the final afternoon, at the end of a 156-kilometer stage. Two contenders had already gone: Marlen Reusser did not start stage 3, and Anna van der Breggen fell ill before stage 4. Swinkels reduced the peloton to fewer than 20 on the lower slopes before Persico took over. Amanda Spratt attacked first, and a group of six formed around Longo Borghini and Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney.

Longo Borghini attacked with 3.7 kilometers to go. Niewiadoma-Phinney got back to her once and was almost on her wheel a second time when Longo Borghini accelerated again, with 2.7 kilometers left, and rode to the finish alone. Monica Trinca Colonel was second on the stage and overall. “I stayed calm and chill until I saw them pretty tired, then I did one attack,” Longo Borghini said. She said the win had been harder than the year before, after an easier winter.

Lorena Wiebes and the sprint stages

The flat days have mostly gone to one rider. Wiebes won stage 2 in 2023 by coming off Kool’s wheel in the last 200 meters, and by the end of the 2025 race she had won half of all the stages the UAE Tour Women had held. In 2024 she also worked on the front for Kopecky on the approach to Jebel Hafeet, the day after her second stage win of that race. She won three more stages in 2026 and the points jersey with them.

This race matters because it tests two distinct skill sets in quick succession. Sprint teams control the opening days, chasing stage wins and bonus seconds on wide desert roads where positioning and wind direction can fracture the field. Then the climbers take over on Jebel Hafeet, a climb of about 10 kilometers that decides the general classification. Elisa Longo Borghini won three of the first four editions, demonstrating the value of patience through the flat stages and explosive power when the road tilts upward. The compressed format leaves no room for recovery, and the February timing means riders are still calibrating their form.