A sprint finish is one of the most electrifying sights in cycling. It’s a celebration of the fine arts of leadout trains and wheel surfing, not to mention the chaos that often throws all of that right out the window. It’s all or nothing in the final seconds of a long day in the saddle. It’s an explosion of raw power.
As the 2025 kicks into gear, we look at the women set to command the sprinting spotlight in 2025, plus the young riders to keep an eye on as they attempt to break into the top tier.
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The top step
Lorena Wiebes is the obvious first choice. The 25-year-old racked up a whopping 22 wins last year – more than a third of SD Worx-Protime’s total.
She swept the RideLondon Classique, won five stages including the prologue at the Baloise Ladies Tour, and took three stages at the Simac Ladies Tour. She shines in the Classics too – she’s the only winner of the women’s Scheldeprijs, which began in 2021, and successfully navigated the cobbled climbs of Gent-Wevelgem for a first victory there last year too.
She’s started 2025 off strong winning all the sprint stages at the UAE Tour and she’ll be the one to beat this season, as she has been for a few years now.
Lidl-Trek’s former World Champion Elisa Balsamo is another to have started the season hot. While unable to score a win in the UAE, she doubled up at the Setmana Ciclista Valenciana. 2022 was her most successful season to date with nine wins, including two at both the Giro d’Italia and the Vuelta Femenina, and since then has been averaging a still-respectable four a year. She’s always towards the front in the Classics and last year she won Trofeo Alfredo Binda and Brugge-De Panne before second places at Gent-Wevelgem and Paris-Roubaix.
Lotte Kopecky is always one to watch, victorious at Paris-Roubaix in the World Champion’s jersey. While not a pure sprinter like her teammate Wiebes, Kopecky is a contender for pretty much every race she lines up at.
The Belgian tends to win sprints from reduced groups after climbs, cobbles or gravel shake up the race, much like the legendary Marianne Vos, who was victorious against Kopecky in a sprint at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad in 2024 and has twice won the Tour de France Femmes’s green jersey.
Charlotte Kool of Picnic-PostNL was the top sprinter at the Tour de France Femmes last year. The 25-year-old, who used to be Wiebes’s leadout, went back-to-back to win the first two stages in her home country of the Netherlands, becoming the first to wear the maillot jaune. It was her best performance of the season after second places at the RideLondon Classique, Tour of Britain and Baloise Ladies Tour – all of which Wiebes won.
If she wants more success in 2025, however, she has to figure out how to overpower her old teammate.
Best of the rest
Pocket rocket Chiara Consonni’s talents stretch across road and track, having won an Olympic gold medal in the madison at Paris 2024. She also shone at last year's Giro d’Italia, winning the sprint on Stage 2 and coming a close second place on Stage 5. Now at Canyon-SRAM-Zondacrypto, she joins a sprint train comprising Chloé Dygert, Maike van der Duin, Tiffany Cromwell and more, which should be a big improvement on UAE Team ADQ’s offering.
Movistar's Liane Lippert might not win frequently, but she at least wins big. Her one win last year came at the Giro d’Italia in a fierce three-up sprint after a breakaway. In 2023, she took a stage at the Tour de France Femmes in a reduced bunch sprint finish after a hilly day, beating Kopecky. She got her 2025 underway by finishing all stages of the Setmana Ciclista Valenciana in the top five.
Her former teammate and new Lidl-Trek signing Emma Norsgaard’s 2023 season was littered with high placings in sprints at the Vuelta Femenina and the Baloise Ladies Tour; the jewel in her crown was a Tour de France Femmes stage, but that was a solo move at the expense of the other sprinters. She had a quieter 2024 so will be looking for more in 2025. The same goes for her new colleague Clara Copponi, who went winless last season but finished on the podium after sprints at the Vuelta a Burgos, RideLondon Classique and UAE Tour.
Wiebes and Kopecky's teammate Mischa Bredewold can be a problem in reduced group finishes after a day of climbing, as evidenced by her two consecutive wins at Itzulia. Similarly Kool's leadout Pfeiffer Georgi is always a contender from the final selection in the Classics, with a standout moment in the 24-year-old’s career outsprinting Vos for the final spot on the podium at Paris-Roubaix 2024.
One of FDJ-Suez's many new signings Ally Wollaston has thrived in the southern hemisphere and is a name to watch this year. With AG Insurance-Soudal in 2024 the Kiwi, who has several track world championship titles to her name, won a stage at the Tour Down Under and two of three stages in Catalunya. She is following a similar pattern so far in 2025, with a close second on the opening day of the Tour Down Under, before wins at the Surf Coast Classic and her first WorldTour win of the year at the Cadel Evans Road Race.
Young stars
Uno-X Mobility’s Anniina Ahtosalo is only 21 years old but has more national titles than most can only dream of, doubling up in Finland's road race and time-trial since 2022. In 2024 she had a breakout year on the road, sprinting to second place at Le Samyn and again on the opening stage of the Tour de France Femmes, winning the U23 ITT European Championship and podiuming at Binche-Chimay-Binche. A big victory should be on the cards soon.
Keep an eye on Flora Perkins too. The British rider joined the Fenix-Deceuninck Development Team from Le Col-Wahoo in 2023 and graduated to the WorldTour squad in 2024. She could be seen at the head of the race at the Vuelta Femenina, where she finished eighth and sixth in two sprint finishes, as well as at the Tour of Britain, with fifth and seventh on Stages 3 and 4.
Finally, Ireland's Lara Gillespie should be on your radar. Fresh from a recent European title in the elimination race, she headed to the UAE Tour and won the sprint classification for UAE Team ADQ. Now Consonni has departed, she can be one to take the reins – although the team will likely be more focussed towards helping new leader Elisa Longo Borghini in Classics and stage race general classifications.
