Advance party en route to fight for women’s Tour
The J-1 team earn vocal support on the road, writes Kate Rowan
On Saturday a peloton of cyclists will ride over the Champselysees cobbles to the finish line of the Tour de France, exhausted yet elated after three weeks of physical and mental toil. The distinctive yellow hoardings will be in place for the conclusion of the 2018 race the following day but there will be a small fraction of the fans, and perhaps one or two cameras.
There will be no yellow jersey, no winner. The 13 women of the J-1 team will finish in unison. For them, there is a prize far more precious at stake: equality.
They are riding to highlight the fact that, unlike major sporting events such as the World Cup, the Rugby World Cup and the golf or tennis majors, there is no female equivalent to the Tour de France. Since July 6 they have completed each stage of the Tour some 24 hours ahead of the likes of Geraint Thomas and Chris Froome in an attempt to prove that women can complete the toughest of all endurance races.
The J-1 stands for Jour minus 1 – the day before – but the full team name has a clear meaning – Donnons des elles au Velo Jour-1 which roughly translates to: “Let the girls ride the day before.”
Women have not been able to ride the same Tour as the men since the 1980s, when the female Tour de France become gradually more and more diluted before being phased out. Now the one opportunity female professionals get during the Tour is La Course, which is a one-day race, usually the equivalent of half a men’s stage. This is not enough in the eyes of the J-1 riders. Despite undertaking the gruelling challenge of completing the entire tour route each year, these women are keen, high-level amateurs rather than professionals.
Tetiana Kalachova, a 30-year-old Ukrainian biochemist on her third Tour, explained that the amateurs were happy to advocate for the rights of the professionals. “There is only one professional women’s team in France – 10 women for the whole country,” she said. “As pro riders, they have responsibility of a schedule but we have more free time, and we are supported by the professional teams such as Wiggle.”
The J-1 team describe their work as a project and it began very much as a personal challenge for coach Mathieu Istil, who came up with the idea alongside his girlfriend Claire and sister Marie. Istil was prompted to encourage the women in his life when he was working as a sports photographer shooting female professional riders and learnt that those on the higher end of the pay scale were earning approximately €3,000 (£2,700) per year. Initially the single support car was driven by Istil’s father but through the power of social media, J-1 has grown into a movement gaining widespread attention in France as well as funding through commercial partnerships.
Kalachova said: “We got a two-minute slot on French television’s coverage of the Tour de France last year – when we came to the mountains – people along the road knew we were coming, so they would come out and would be cheering. Sometimes it is as if women don’t exist, if people can’t see us, so they don’t care. Two minutes is enough for people to notice us and they will come out and cheer.”
Anna Barrero, a Catalan former elite-level triathlete, began her involvement in J-1 via her day job as a sport scientist. She then got back on her bike and took
‘It will take longer to ride a stage but we are capable of riding the Tour’
on the role of pitching J-1 to potential sponsors. “I would spend the whole year writing. You send 100 letters and you get one response,” she said. “Then Skoda contacted me in February. I was really surprised because I am usually approaching people myself. When we have support from big name brands, it makes us feel like our project is real and is making a difference. People see a brand behind us and it makes them change their minds that this isn’t some stupid, crazy plan.”
In spite of the media and commercial progress, the J-1 ambition to have a women’s Tour is very much out of their hands with ASO, the Tour de France organiser, telling them there will be no official support.
“We asked them the question, ‘Will there be a women’s version?’ and they said ‘No, not likely’. They respect our presence but do not provide the main support of our project,” said Kalachova. “Support comes from down rather than up.”
As the women cycled the fourth stage from La Baule in the Loire-atlantique north into picturesque Breton wheat fields, the support was most certainly there. Many of those who were cheering were eager Tour de France fans pitching up a day early to get a coveted spot for the following day’s main attraction. But various school groups lined the
villages, with the youngsters oblivious to gender and just keen to roar on Tour de France cyclists. Then, much like the section in
Forrest Gump where the titular character starts running alone but influences a legion to run alongside him, more than 80 local cyclists joined the J-1 peloton as they progressed through Brittany.
One high-profile supporter at the end of the stage in Sarzeau was the town’s mayor David Lappartient, who is rather more well-known as the president of the UCI, world cycling’s governing body. Given the stance of the ASO his presence was curious, but it served to highlight some of the contradictions and complications surrounding the J-1 mission.
The French ministries for sport and women’s rights are backers of the team, however, and there was also a famous British face in attendance in the shape of Dame Sarah Storey, the 14-time Paralympic gold medallist in cycling and swimming. Storey rode a stage with J-1 and believes there is solid support for their cause while highlighting attitudes to women in sport as a significant barrier to their progress.
“It wasn’t until I arrived in France and I rode with the women that I realised just how big it is and what it means,” she said. “The way the people were talking about les
filles, the girls doing the tour, was just amazing. There was a sense of this is what should be happening. There are so many political and logistical things between what it is today and what it could be but the
fact that the audience is definitely there shows the possibility.
“I think the biggest barrier is attitude and people thinking this is the status quo – that the men are superior, the women aren’t interesting and therefore the women should just shut up. There shouldn’t be that attitude of ‘Here you go little ladies, that will do’. We would like to be able to race in the same iconic races and have that platform because 50 per cent of the population deserve to be inspired.”
There have been, though, questions over whether women can physically ride the Tour. After completing La Course last week Kasia Niewiadoma, who came fifth, voiced her concerns over women being able to manage more than a week-long race, admitting her family have feared for her welfare. “My family want me to stop riding so much and they don’t want me to put in so much physical effort – they keep telling me it is not the race of my life,” she said.
That viewpoint is not supported by Kalachova and Barrero, with the latter, who works researching cardiac fatigue in cyclists, particularly forthright. “The muscular mass on a women’s body is different,” said Barrera. “Obviously, it is going to take longer for a woman to ride a stage. But women are perfectly capable to cycle the Tour. Yes, we are going to need more time, women have more fat on their bodies and less power. There is less strength but we are perfectly capable.”
There are also questions over the logistics of a women’s tour, while it is not clear how the media would cover it when the men are 200 kilometres behind. But one vision keeps Kalachova and the J-1 women inspired.
“In five years, I would like to take a camper van and sit at the side of the road, drinking champagne and watch the women’s Tour de France cycled by professionals,” she said. “But there is still a lot of work to do. We have to keep on riding, the women’s Tour de France isn’t back yet.”