Two-time road world champion Lotte Kopecky has already ruled out a tilt at next summer’s Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, and instead hopes to target “as many Classics as possible”.
The SD Worx-Protime rider, who finished second at the Tour in 2023, returned to the race this July and placed 45th, in a season marred by knee and lower back pain.
Speaking to Cycling Weekly two days ahead of this year’s Tour, Kopecky relinquished her yellow jersey dream and said she was “just trying to get the GC out of my head”. The Belgian has now come to the same decision for next year’s race, still more than nine months out.
“I can already say that I’m not thinking about a Tour de France classification in 2026. I think I should mainly do what I love most,” Kopecky told Sporza at the Belgian Track Championships, where she won the omnium title.
“I do have a plan in mind. I’m thinking about the European Track Championships in early February. After that, I want to ride as many Classics as possible, and preferably win them.”
Kopecky (left) came second at the Tour de France, behind Demi Vollering, in 2023. The Belgian also placed second at the Giro d’Italia the following year.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
Already a Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix winner, Kopecky skipped her usual opening Classics this year – Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Strade Bianche – due to a persistent knee injury over the winter.
She returned to racing in late March, and went on to win a third Tour of Flanders, one of three victories this season, alongside the Belgian Time Trial Championships and a stage of the Tour Féminin International de l’Ardèche. She later withdrew from the French race after suffering a fractured vertebrae in a crash.
“I’m someone who does a lot by feeling. But last season I started working with a dietician and that was a big burden for me,” she said of her performances this year.
“Now the numbers came in and you expect huge changes. But they didn’t happen. It was already too much mentally during the preparation.”
Kopecky’s appearance at last weekend’s Belgian Track Championships came two months after her crash at the Tour de l’Ardèche. She chose to skip her UCI Road World Championships defence in September, and the UCI Track World Championships last month, which she said was “the best decision to give myself a rest and immediately think about next season”.
Casting her mind ahead to 2026, she said: “It’s still a long way off, but I’m already looking forward to it.
“I hope to be back there in the spring. I’m really looking forward to what’s to come, that’s the most important thing.”
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