The final startlist for the eighth edition of the Women’s Tour, which begins in Colchester tomorrow (Monday 6 June), has been revealed.

This year’s race will feature 97 riders across 17 teams, including 13 of the 14 UCI Women’s WorldTour squads. Click here to download the Women’s Tour 2022 startlist.

Among the field will be a pair of former winners: Coryn Labecki (Team Jumbo – Visma) and Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon//SRAM Racing). The latter is once again eyeing victory, having won the 2017 edition and finished second two years later.

“My goal is to win a stage and fight for the best place in GC,” she said. “Of course, I will adapt it to the team’s needs but I would like to feel some pressure for the performance during the race.”

Niewiadoma’s team-mate is Alice Barnes, who finished as the leading British rider in the 2021 race in seventh overall. “I love racing the Women’s Tour,” said Barnes. “I love the crowds that come out, especially during the week when schools are along the streets cheering for us. I am looking forward to this year as we have a big variation in stages which will make the racing interesting.”

Fellow Briton Lizzie Holden (Le Col – Wahoo) is preparing for her third edition of the Women’s Tour, having also raced in the virtual ŠKODA V-Women’s Tour edition held during the first lockdown.

Holden said: “I’m very excited to be back racing on British soil!  Being a part of a British team feels a little bit more special.  The fans are always so welcoming. We’re coming with a strong team to target all the terrains the Tour is throwing at us. I think there’s a chance for everyone with sprint stages, punchy stages and the mountain top finish up Black Mountain.

“I’m feeling pretty good and hopefully I can carry it through to the Women’s Tour, It would be amazing to target the GC, but also animating the race and going for stages is something that excites me.”

Heading to the Women’s Tour in good form is Team BikeExchange – Jayco rider Alexandra Manley, who won four stages and the overall of the Lotto Thüringen Ladies Tour in Germany last week.

“It’s a WorldTour event and a notoriously hard week of racing”, said Manly. “But we are all ready and eager to race together again. I think we’re all really excited to try and carry the momentum we have from our May race block into this tour.”

 Also lining up will be a number of distinctive jerseys, with European road race champion Ellen van Dijk (Trek – Segafredo) joining the national road race champions of Britain (Pfeiffer Georgi, Team DSM), Israel (Omer Shapira, EF Education – TIBCO – SVB), Italy (Elisa Longo Borghini, Trek – Segafredo), Canada (Alison Jackson, Liv Racing Xstra); Czech Republic (Tereza Neumanova, Liv Racing Xstra) and Austria (Kathrin Schweinberger, CERATIZIT – WNT Pro Cycling).