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Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift gallery
Our squad's favorite pictures from the Tour de France
August 19, 2024
EF-Oatly-Cannondale's first-ever Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift was an unforgettable experience.
From the Grand Dèpart in Rotterdam to the grand finale at the summit of l'Alpe d'Huez, photographers Anouk Flesch and Jered and Ashley Gruber were there to capture the race for us. Kristen, Lotta, Noemi, Alison, Mags, Kim, and Clara will cherish their images of the peloton parting huge crowds in the mountains, their hugs after sprint finishes, and all the quiet moments and laughs they shared in the bus. These are some of our squad's favorites.
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Kristen Faulkner
From Harvard to venture capital to double Olympic Gold, Kristen Faulkner’s path has been anything but conventional. But one thing is a constant – her rigorous pursuit of excellence.
Before she became a cyclist, the double Olympic gold medalist and back-to-back US road race champion earned her bachelor’s degree in computer science at Harvard, where she competed on the university rowing team. She finished second in the world junior rowing championships, before moving to New York City to pursue her career with a venture capital firm.
She missed team sports, so she went to a women’s introductory cycling clinic in Central Park. She enjoyed that enough to do a race and once she experienced how much strategy and tactical thinking cycling required, she knew it was the sport for her.
The 33-year-old has always dreamed big. Ever since she was a little girl, Kristen wanted to compete in the Olympic Games.
Her childhood in Homer, Alaska helped her develop a sense of resiliency. Kristen’s parents run a restaurant and hotel in her hometown and she has been always inspired by their work ethic. That work ethic, combined with her Olympic dream, inspired her to take up a new discipline, the team pursuit in track cycling in 2024, alongside road racing.
She sees bike racing as a game of chess, where strategy, patience, and anticipating a competitor’s move make the sport demanding and thrilling. On the streets of Paris, she rode a smart, tactical race, biding her time on the circuit up and around Montmartre, before making a big effort to close to the leaders with just over three kilometers to go. Knowing that her rivals at the front of the race might hesitate in the hope that the other would chase, Kristen attacked and rode solo to the finish under the Eiffel Tower to win her first Olympic gold medal.
With hard work and intelligence, she had made her childhood dream come true. She celebrated with her family and then turned her attention back to the track and her pursuit of excellence. A few days later, Kristen won her second Olympic gold medal with her teammates in the team pursuit.
Since joining EF Education-Oatly, Kristen has earned wins at Omloop van het Hageland, two stages at Trofeo Ponente in Rosa where she also claimed the points and mountains jerseys, a stage at the Vuelta España Femenina, and the US road race national championship two years in a row. Her 2025 season was cut short due to a shoulder injury which only means Kristen is that much more excited for the 2026 season.
At her European base in Girona, Spain, Kristen likes to grocery shop at the local farmers markets, letting fresh produce inspire her in the kitchen. She loves creating healthy, vegetable-based dishes. A lifelong learner, she always has a couple of books on the go and you’ll usually find her reading on the transfers between stages.
Noemi Rüegg
In Noemi’s first two seasons at EF Education-Oatly, the former Swiss national champion has started by winning her first race of the season: in 2024, she outsprinted the field at Trofeo Felanitx-Colònia de Sant Jordi to take the first ever win for the squad. Then in 2025, at the Tour Down Under, Noemi soloed to victory on the queen stage and then went on to win the overall general classification. She podiumed at the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race and had top ten results at Strade Bianche and Trofeo Alfredo Binda before she sprinted to third place at the first modern edition of Sanremo women. Noemi finished the 2025 season with another podium, this time at Tre Valli Varesine.
Noemi is a punchy rider who can get over hard climbs. She is still trying to find out where her limits lie.
She came to bike racing through her family. At first, her goal was simply to keep up with her older brother. Their dad was involved with a local cycling club and Noemi slowly grew more and more curious. When she was 13, she finished her first cyclocross race and was hooked.
Noemi turned professional on the road as a 19-year-old, leaving her full-time job caring for disabled people in a home. She is a two-time U23 Swiss time trial national champion but her heart belongs to the classics. Noemi loves a tough course, the more chaotic, the better. She is not afraid to be aggressive in the peloton and loves the excitement and energy of a hectic race.
Her ultimate goals are to podium in one of the classics and to develop as a stage racer. Noemi is only just getting started.
Magdeleine Vallieres
Magdeleine soloing to victory at the 2025 world championships in Rwanda may have been a surprise for some people, but not to Mags’ teammates and loved ones. The consummate teammate, she has proven herself in the mountains in big stage races like the Vuelta a España Femenina, the Giro d’Italia Women, and the Tour de France Femmes, and one-day races like Strade Biance and Amstel Gold. Her enthusiasm for cycling drives her.
She was about eight years old when she learned to ride a bike without training wheels. That Christmas, she got a new bike and the following summer her dad took her on a nine-day, 1,000 kilometer bikepacking trip. She credits her dad – and that trip – with creating her passion for cycling that has guided her life ever since.
It led her to her first pro win in 2024, when she won the Trofeo Palma Femina in Mallorca. It later led her to her rainbow jersey, which she won at the world championships in Kigali.
Growing up in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Magdeleine rode with her local club. She raced mountain bikes, cyclocross, and road bikes as a teenager. She also learned how to track stand and to this day cannot resist the urge to track stand when she waits at red lights. As much as she loved racing in Québec, Magdeleine soon realized that if she wanted to continue to compete and grow as a rider, she needed to go to Europe. She earned a spot with the UCI’s World Cycling Center program where she spent two seasons soaking up every opportunity she encountered before she turned pro.
This year is Magdeleine’s fifth as a professional racer. Don’t take your eyes off her for a moment.
Kim Cadzow
Kim is a two-time New Zealand time trial national champion and the 2025 road national champion. Since joining EF Education-Oatly in 2024, she has won a stage and the general classification at the Trofeo Ponente in Rosa and put in an impressive performance at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, narrowly missing out on the win in 2024. Kim made her Olympic debut in Paris and finished seventh in the time trial.
The 24-year-old came to cycling after a short stint in triathlon, a sport she took up as a teenager. When she grew tired of constant running injuries, she made the switch to cycling and has loved every minute of it.
She excels both in time trialing and on long climbs and appreciates the straightforwardness of both disciplines. Racing a TT or a climb means she doesn’t have to worry too much about tactics and can focus on pedaling and pushing herself to her limits, something Kim loves to do.
Off the bike, she loves to relax with her husband by going for an easy ride or watching movies together. Kim values the time she gets to spend in New Zealand when she’s surrounded by her family and the landscape she adores.