Ronde van Vlaanderen Women

The women's Ronde van Vlaanderen, also known as the Tour of Flanders Women, is a one-day bike race in Belgium, the women's edition of the Flemish Monument. First held in 2004, it is built around the same Flemish bergs and cobbled sectors that define the spring classics calendar. It sits at the heart of April's cobbled week, demanding both climbing punch and tactical sharpness.

The Tour of Flanders Women is the women’s Ronde van Vlaanderen, first raced in 2004 over the cobbled climbs of the Flemish Ardennes. It finishes in Oudenaarde after the Oude Kwaremont and the Paterberg. Lotte Kopecky holds the record with three wins.

Zabirova, Melchers and the first winners

Zulfiya Zabirova won the first edition, ahead of Trixi Worrack and Leontien van Moorsel. Mirjam Melchers won the next two. Nobody won two in a row again until Kopecky in 2022 and 2023.

Nicole Cooke won in 2007, and Judith Arndt in 2008 and 2012. Grace Verbeke became the first Belgian winner in 2010, and it was 12 years before there was a second. Annemiek van Vleuten won in 2011 and Marianne Vos in 2013.

Koppenberg, Oude Kwaremont and Paterberg: the women’s route

The race has become longer. It was 139.6 kilometers in 2014, 152.4 in 2021 and 168.9 in 2025. The Koppenberg was added in 2022: 600 meters of rough cobbles with pitches of up to 22 percent, which until then had been part of the men’s race only. Tomas Van Den Spiegel of the organizer, Flanders Classics, said the aim was “to make the women’s courses as close to the men’s courses as we could.”

The last two climbs are the same from year to year. The Oude Kwaremont, a long cobbled climb, starts 18 kilometers from the finish. The Paterberg comes last, and from its top it is about 13 kilometers to the line in Oudenaarde.

Ellen van Dijk’s 27-kilometer solo in 2014

Ellen van Dijk was the world time trial champion in 2014, and she attacked with 27 kilometers to go, just before the Kruisberg. With only the Paterberg left she led by 38 seconds. Her Boels Dolmans teammate Lizzie Armitstead beat Emma Johansson in the sprint for second, and won the race herself two years later.

“I wanted to win three races in my career: the world title, the Tour of Flanders and the Olympics,” Van Dijk said. “Now only one remains.”

Annemiek van Vleuten wins ten years after her first

Van Vleuten’s two wins came ten years apart, in 2011 and 2021. In 2021 she took the lead at the bottom of the Paterberg, dropped a group that included world champion Anna van der Breggen and reached the top eight seconds clear. “Eight seconds at the top was not much, I knew I needed more, to get out of sight, because of the long finishing straight,” she said. She won by 26 seconds, and Lisa Brennauer beat Grace Brown in the sprint for second.

Lotte Kopecky’s record three wins

Kopecky won for the first time in 2022, wearing the national champion’s jersey. Her SD Worx teammate Chantal van den Broek-Blaak attacked with 11 kilometers to go, Van Vleuten closed the gap with Kopecky on her wheel, and Van den Broek-Blaak then did most of the work to the finish. Kopecky beat Van Vleuten in the sprint, and Van den Broek-Blaak was third.

In 2023 she won alone. Four riders went clear after the Koppenberg, three of them from SD Worx, and Kopecky dropped the last of the others, Silvia Persico, on the Oude Kwaremont. Demi Vollering won the sprint for second, so SD Worx finished first and second.

Her third win, in 2025, came in the world champion’s jersey and in a sprint of four, ahead of Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, Liane Lippert and Kasia Niewiadoma. No rider had won three before.

Elisa Longo Borghini’s second win in 2024

The one edition from 2022 to 2025 that Kopecky did not win went to Elisa Longo Borghini, nine years after her first in 2015. It began to rain just after the start of the 163-kilometer race. Her Lidl-Trek teammate Shirin van Anrooij was alone in front when Longo Borghini and Niewiadoma attacked on the Paterberg, and they joined her 12 kilometers from the finish. Van Anrooij led out the sprint, Niewiadoma came past her, and Longo Borghini came past Niewiadoma. “I was just a kid when I won back in 2015,” Longo Borghini said.

Demi Vollering wins alone from the Oude Kwaremont in 2026

Vollering had been second in 2023, behind her teammate Kopecky. In 2026 she rode for FDJ United-Suez and wore the European champion’s jersey. A front group of 20 formed on the Koppenberg, and her teammates kept the pace high as far as the Oude Kruisberg. Her first attack, on the Hotond straight after it, took four riders with her and was brought back on the descent.

She went again as soon as she reached the cobbles of the Oude Kwaremont, and this time nobody could stay with her. She led by 27 seconds with 12 kilometers to go and won by 42.

It was her first win in the race. Ferrand-Prévot was second for the second year running, ahead of Puck Pieterse, and Kopecky finished fourth.

This is the race that crowns the cobbled classics season for the women's peloton. The Ronde rewards riders who can keep making hard efforts after the rest of the field has started to fade, and it has become a Monument where victories reshape reputations. The winner list combines repeat champions and one-day specialists, which tells you how complete a rider must be to win here.