The 2025 Liège-Bastogne-Liège Femmes came down to four riders in a mad dash to the line in the Belgian Ardennes with Kim Le Court (AG Insurance-Soudal) making history as Mauritian national champion.
The 29-year-old beat Puck Pieterse (Fenix-Deceuninck), Demi Vollering (FDJ-Suez), and Cedrine Kerbaol (EF Education-Oatly) on the line.
After being dropped a few times, Le Court found her rhythm on the Côte de la Roche-aux-Faucons, and was able to bridge up to Vollering and Pieterse. The trio then reeled Kerbaol back inside of the final 10 kilometres.
Vollering led the quatuor into the finale with Le Court on her wheel, only started to believe that she could take the victory in the final sprint.
"To be honest when I bridged the gap of Roche-aux-Faucons I really felt strong compared to the others. When I bridged to them I saw they were really suffering, of course I was suffering too but for me to make that effort to bridge to them I knew I had maybe a bit more legs," Le Court said.
"I really didn't know [that I could win] until I got to the sprint and I just kicked and I just never looked back. I could see I think Puck's wheel, but yeah, I just didn't stop.
"It's been always so close this whole season and I've actually aimed for Liège-Bastogne-Liège this whole season. It's been really the last classics I really wanted to win, so I can't believe we made it all together as a team."
How it unfolded
On the ninth running of the women's Liege-Bastogne-Liege, the riders started in the Place McAuliffe, Bastogne, with a star-studded peloton heading to Liège.
The race started in the town of Bastogne with a course of 152.9km heading to Liege. There were three non-starters, Debora Silvestri (Laboral Kutxa-Fundación Euskadi), Julie Vlyminck (DD Grou) and Chloé Dygert (Canyon-SRAM-Zondacrypto).
There was one group of five riders that tried to make an early breakaway, but they were caught just a few minutes after forming.
A nasty crash early on saw both Silvia Persico (UAE Team ADQ) and Liane Lippert (Movistar) come down, with the former being forced to abandon a few moments later, just after the first of 10 classified climbs, the Côte de Saint-Roch.
Three riders got a gap on the peloton with just under 130km to go they were Tiril Jørgensen (Coop-Repsol), Constance Valentin (Winspace-Orange-Seal) and Victoire Guilman (Cofidis), with Laura Molenaar (VolkerWessels) going for a bridge. They quickly got over a minute.
The peloton climbs the day's first hill, the Côte de Saint-Roch (Image credit: Getty Images)
Another counter move went away with Solbjørk Minke Anderson (Uno-X Mobility), Fariba Hashimi (Ceratizit), Sylvie Swinkels (Roland) and Danielle De Francesco (Arkea-B&B Hotels) getting a gap. All three groups came together with 112km to go, forming an eight-rider group which held a maximum gap of four minutes.
The breakaway was dragged back after it lost cohesion with just over 70km to go, with FDJ-Suez controlling the peloton for their leader, Demi Vollering.
More moves came and went, Maeva Squiban (UAE Team ADQ) was one of the riders who did get away with 50km to go. She pulled out over a minute on the bunch. As the gap began to close, Valentina Cavallar (Arkea-B&B Hotels) launched a counter move to try and bridge.
Both were caught just before and during the infamous Côte de la Redoute with a major shock with Italian champion, Elisa Longo-Borghini (UAE Team ADQ), getting dropped on the climb.
A group of 15 riders went clear on the Côte de la Redoute. The big favourites didn't commit to any attacks with just over 30km to go, and multiple riders rejoined.
Pauliena Rooijakkers (Fenix-Deceuninck) launched a move on the flat after the descent and got a small gap with Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime), Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM-Zondacrypto) and Kerbaol joining the Dutch climber at the front of the race.
FDJ-Suez did set a good tempo in the chase, but then Pauline Ferrand-Prevot (Visma-Lease A Bike) tried a move which was marked. Elise Chabbey (FDJ-Suez) pushed hard and started working hard to bring the leaders back.
Up front, Kerbaol launched on a small descent, using her amazing technical ability. However, Niedermaier was quick to drag her back to reform the group of four. They had over 20 seconds with 20km to go.
Puck Pieterse and Demi Vollering lead the way up the Côte de La Redoute (Image credit: Getty Images)
Movistar went all out to try and bring the leaders back before the final climb of the Côte de la Roche-aux-Faucons. Van der Breggen and Kerbaol held on for the longes but Rooijakkers dropped back to bring her teammate, Puck Pieterse up to the front along with Kopecky and Vollering.
Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM-Zondacrypto), Marlen Reusser (Movistar) and the rest all left behind.
Vollering used the steepest gradients to try and drop Kopecky. However, the world champion held on along with Pieterse and Kerbaol. Despite the infernal pace by Vollering, Kopecky managed to hold on over the top of the Roche-aux-Faucons with a gap of about 10" over the closest chaser, Reusser.
Once again, using the descent, Kerbaol went clear with 12km to go as the other three riders looked at each other, and Reusser joined the chase.
Just before a large chasing group joined the group of Vollering, Pieters, Kopecky and Reusser, the winner of Fleche Wallonne, Pieterse, launched. However, Le Court rejoined the main group with Kopecky and Reusser both getting dropped.
Kerboal was dragged back by Vollering, Pieterse and Le Court with just over 8km to go. The French rider then sat on the back with the chasing group just around 30 seconds down.
No one wanted to go early, and it all came down to a sprint with Vollering leading out. Le Court came flying off her wheel, and the extremely powerful Mauritian rider was too fast for Pieterse, with Kerbaol missing out on the podium.
Kopecky led the chasing pack home 24 seconds back on the leading group in Liege.
The sprint for the finish line (Image credit: Getty Images)
