Tour of Chongming Island

Tour of Chongming Island is a three-day women's WorldTour cycling stage race on China's third-largest island, located in the Yangtze River delta near Shanghai. First run in 2007 and usually held in May until 2019, it returned from a three-year break in October 2023 and has been part of the Women's WorldTour since the series began in 2016.

The Tour of Chongming Island is a three-day Women’s WorldTour stage race on a flat island in the mouth of the Yangtze, just north of Shanghai. Most stages end in bunch sprints, and bonus seconds usually decide the overall title. Charlotte Becker in 2018 and Anne Knijnenburg in 2025 won it from breakaways.

When did the Tour of Chongming Island begin?

The women’s stage race was first held in 2007. A Chongming race had existed since 2003, and in 2006 it joined the UCI calendar with a five-stage men’s race that Robert McLachlan won. The first women’s edition had four stages and was preceded by a separate 12-kilometer time trial. Li Meifang won it by arriving alone on the last and longest stage, 100 kilometers to Chongdong, where she took the yellow jersey from Belinda Goss. She won again in 2008.

In 2010 the organizers replaced the time trial with a one-day World Cup race and cut the stage race to three days. Ina-Yoko Teutenberg won both races in 2010 and again in 2011. Kirsten Wild did the same in 2014 and won the stage race again in 2015. The one-day race was dropped after 2015, and in 2016 the stage race joined the new Women’s WorldTour. Chloe Hosking won that edition, seven years after her first victory in 2009.

The race was not held from 2020 to 2022. It returned in October 2023, and the 2024 and 2025 editions were also run in October.

Chongming’s flat roads and Yangtze bridges

Chongming is an alluvial island of about 1,300 square kilometers and part of the municipality of Shanghai. Since 2009 it has been linked to the city by a tunnel to Changxing Island and, from there, by the 16-kilometer Shanghai Yangtze River Bridge. The roads are wide and straight, with tight corners. The opening stage in 2018 never rose above 20 meters. The highest point of that whole race was 60 meters, on the bridge from Changxing, and it carried the day’s only mountain point. In 2024 the mountains sprint was on the same bridge, nine kilometers into the second stage, and Knijnenburg won it.

In 2023 the last stage was laps of an 11.5-kilometer circuit around Chongming New City Park, and the final stages of 2018 and 2024 used a circuit of the same length. With no hill to split the field, bonus seconds at the intermediate sprints and the finish count for more than in most stage races. In 2023 Chiara Consonni started the last stage third, two seconds behind, won the sprint and took the race on time bonuses.

Charlotte Becker wins from a breakaway in 2018

The first stage of 2018 went to Giorgia Bronzini after two crashes in the finale. The second crash, about 250 meters from the line, caught Wild and Jolien D’hoore.

On the second stage the sprinters’ teams let five riders go too far. The gap reached 3 minutes 34 seconds with 27 kilometers left, and the break still had 1 minute 12 seconds at the finish. Becker won the sprint from Shannon Malseed and Anastasia Iakovenko and led Malseed by five seconds overall. Her Hitec Products team controlled the last stage, and Wild won it ahead of D’hoore and Bronzini. Becker, Malseed and Iakovenko kept the first three places overall.

Lorena Wiebes sweeps all three stages in 2019

In 2019 Lorena Wiebes won all three stages and the overall, points and young rider classifications. She was 20 and rode for Parkhotel Valkenburg. Jutatip Maneephan of Thailand and Lotte Kopecky were second and third on the last stage and in the final standings.

Wiebes later told the UCI that the race changed how she sprinted: “In Chongming I started my own sprints most of the time. That changed my other races later in the season because I knew that when I start the sprint, it's better than when you wait for the others.”

Ceratizit-WNT’s podium sweep in 2024

On the second stage of 2024, Ceratizit-WNT took the first three places. The stage started on Changxing and ran 129 kilometers to New City Park. Sandra Alonso led the team to the 500-meter mark and Kathrin Schweinberger opened the sprint. Marta Lach and Mylène de Zoete came off her wheel in the last 100 meters to finish first and second, with Schweinberger third.

De Zoete, the winner of the first stage, kept the yellow jersey by three seconds from Lach. A day later Lach won the final stage as well, and the bonus seconds put her ahead of her teammate in the final standings.

Knijnenburg’s one-second victory in 2025

Knijnenburg, who rode for VolkerWessels, had come close to a stage win in 2024. On the last stage that year she went solo with 23 kilometers left and was caught 4.5 kilometers from the finish. In 2025 she was in the break again on the second stage, which Sofie van Rooijen won to lead the race by eight seconds. Knijnenburg started the last stage seventh overall, 16 seconds behind.

Ten riders went clear inside the last four kilometers of that stage, and a crash in the chase behind them brought down Van Rooijen. Josie Talbot won the sprint ahead of Riejanne Markus and Knijnenburg. Knijnenburg won the race by one second, with Van Rooijen second on countback, Tamara Dronova third and Markus fourth.

This is a test of sprint teams and flat-road positioning. Held on a low-lying island of wide, straight roads and tight corners, the race rewards teams that can control the front, hold position, and deliver fast finishers day after day. It is also the longest-standing Women's WorldTour event in China, offering a rare window into the sport's presence there and a chance to see how European-based teams adapt to long-haul travel and unfamiliar roads.