Lorena Wiebes successfully defended her La Choralis Fourmies Féminine title, beating Lara Gillespie and Gladys Verhulst-Wild in Fourmies as the race again came down to the fast finishers.
The Team SD Worx-Protime rider took her second consecutive victory in the 126.4km Women’s ProSeries race, becoming the first rider to win La Choralis Fourmies Féminine more than once. Gillespie repeated her 2025 second place for UAE Team L’IMAD, while Verhulst-Wild again finished third for AG Insurance-Soudal.
The similarities with last year went even further. Nienke Veenhoven finished fourth and Kathrin Schweinberger fifth, meaning the first five riders crossed the line in exactly the same order as they had 12 months earlier.
Longer 2026 route still ends with the sprinters in control
The main question before the race was whether the revised La Choralis Fourmies Féminine 2026 route would provide enough difficulty to disrupt Wiebes and her SD Worx-Protime team.
The 126.4km course retained the familiar start and finish in Fourmies but added another loop between Avesnes-sur-Helpe and Sains-du-Nord. That kept the peloton on the rolling roads of the Avesnois for longer before the return towards the finishing circuits.
There was still no single climb capable of deciding the race. For the teams trying to beat Wiebes, the opportunity was to use the accumulation of short climbs and constant changes in rhythm to reduce SD Worx-Protime’s control before the race returned to Fourmies.
That was also the central problem in the pre-race contenders preview. Beating Wiebes in a direct sprint was always going to be difficult. The better route was to stop her reaching that situation at all.
The extended middle section was not enough to do it.
Wiebes reaches Fourmies with another chance to sprint
The 2026 start list contained considerably more sprint depth than Wiebes had faced when she won the race a year ago.
Charlotte Kool, Gillespie, Veenhoven, former winner Silvia Zanardi, Verhulst-Wild and Schweinberger were all present, while riders such as Pfeiffer Georgi offered teams a more attacking alternative.
By the time the race returned towards Fourmies, however, enough of the leading fast finishers were still present for the familiar tactical problem to return. Wiebes had survived the selective part of the course and was heading towards a finish that suited her.
Gillespie was again one of the riders best placed to challenge her. The Irish champion had finished second behind Wiebes here in 2025 and has continued to close the gap to the established sprint specialists during 2026.
Fourmies produced the same order.
Wiebes was quickest when the race reached its decisive sprint, with Gillespie taking second and Verhulst-Wild completing the podium.
Gillespie and Verhulst-Wild repeat their 2025 podium places
Gillespie’s second place continued a strong season and underlined how well the Fourmies course suits her. The rolling middle section is hard enough to remove some pure sprinters without taking away the speed she needs for the finish.
The difficulty remains Wiebes.
Gillespie has now finished directly behind the Dutch rider in consecutive editions, and another reduced sprint again left her trying to find a way past the strongest finisher in the field.
Verhulst-Wild also repeated her result from last September. The French rider took third for AG Insurance-Soudal, giving the home crowd another podium finish and continuing an impressive record at Fourmies.
Veenhoven was fourth for Team Visma | Lease a Bike, while Schweinberger completed the top five for Human Powered Health.
All five positions matched the 2025 result exactly: Wiebes, Gillespie, Verhulst-Wild, Veenhoven and Schweinberger.
Wiebes becomes the first two-time winner
The result changes the history of La Choralis Fourmies Féminine in one significant respect.
Every completed edition before 2026 had produced a different winner. Thi That Nguyen won the inaugural race in 2019, followed by Pfeiffer Georgi in 2021, Clara Copponi in 2022, Marta Lach in 2023, Zanardi in 2024 and Wiebes in 2025.
Wiebes is now the first rider to win it twice.
Her back-to-back victories also reinforce the direction the race has taken since joining the Women’s ProSeries. Fourmies remains rolling enough to encourage attacks and the 2026 route gave those moves more terrain, but the course still leaves a route back into contention for the strongest sprinters.
Marta Lach showed in 2023 that a late move can beat the bunch. Zanardi and Wiebes have since produced three consecutive editions won from the faster finishers.
The challenge for Wiebes’s rivals therefore remains much the same as it was before the start. Surviving alongside her is not enough. At Fourmies, the race has to be changed before the final sprint.
La Choralis Fourmies Féminine 2026 result
Data powered by FirstCycling.com
Main photo credit: Getty
