Live: 2025 Dwars Door Vlaanderen Women

Mathew Mitchell

Published on April 2, 2025
in Women's Cycling

The women’s Dwars Door Vlaanderen has quietly become one of the most unpredictable and tactically diverse races of the spring. Since its addition to the UCI calendar in 2017, the race has produced everything from full-bunch sprints to long-range solo wins, with no clear pattern year to year. That variability is exactly what makes it so compelling.

Last season, Marianne Vos came out on top in a sprint from a large group but that came just twelve months after Demi Vollering blew the race apart with a solo attack nearly 40km from the line, holding off the chase with time to spare. In 2022, Chiara Consonni won from a reduced group, while 2021 saw a well-timed two-up move from Annemiek van Vleuten and Kasia Niewiadoma make the difference. Each edition reflects a race where multiple outcomes are always in play.

The 2025 route reinforces that same unpredictability. While the early kilometres are typically quiet, the intensity builds rapidly after the halfway point. The Knokteberg, aka the Côte de Trieu, at 55km to go tends to act as the launchpad. From there, the course is relentless: the Hotondberg, Mariaborrestraat, Eikenberg, Doorn and Huisepontweg all follow in quick succession. The Nokereberg at 22km out is the last major climb before the run-in, but it’s the two passes of Herlegemstraat that could prove decisive. Narrow, twisting and hard to control, this is often where the final splits are forced.

The timing of the race adds an extra layer. Sitting just five days before the Tour of Flanders, some riders are here for fine-tuning, others are chasing results, and a few are quietly hoping to seize an opportunity before the focus shifts to Sunday. That combination of form, fatigue and freedom often produces aggressive racing from unexpected sources.

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