| Fifth edition of the UCI Women's World Tour | |
| Details | |
|---|---|
| Dates | 1 February – 8 November 2020 |
| Location | |
| Races | 11 |
| Champions | |
| Individual champion | Lizzie Deignan (Great Britain) (Trek–Segafredo) |
| Teams' champion | Trek–Segafredo |
The 2020 UCI Women's World Tour was a competition that initially included twenty-one road cycling events throughout the 2020 women's cycling season. It was the fifth edition of the ranking system launched by the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) in 2016. The competition began with the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race Women on 1 February.[1] The schedule was extensively affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, which resulted in two-thirds of the races on the calendar being either postponed or cancelled outright.[2] As a result, the season was extended until 8 November, when the final stage of the Ceratizit Challenge by la Vuelta took place.[3][4]
Great Britain's Lizzie Deignan became the fifth rider in as many years to win the overall classification,[5] amassing a tally of 1622.33 points for Trek–Segafredo. Deignan won consecutive races in August at the GP de Plouay and La Course by Le Tour de France,[6][7] before adding a season-high third victory at Liège–Bastogne–Liège.[8] Deignan finished 55 points clear of her Trek–Segafredo team mate Elisa Longo Borghini;[5] Longo Borghini failed to win any overall classifications, recording a best finish of second place at the season-ending Ceratizit Challenge by la Vuelta.[9] She also finished in third place at the Giro Rosa,[10] and had six other top-ten finishes during the season. Lisa Brennauer of Ceratizit–WNT Pro Cycling finished third in the overall classification with 1424.67 points, after recording podium finishes in three of the season's final four races: third at Gent–Wevelgem,[11] second at the Three Days of Bruges–De Panne,[12] and victory at the Ceratizit Challenge by la Vuelta.[9] From the 11 individual events, a total of 8 riders won races while the World Tour lead was held during the season by Liane Lippert (Team Sunweb), Deignan and Anna van der Breggen (Boels–Dolmans), who was the only other rider to win multiple races, at the Giro Rosa and La Flèche Wallonne.[10][13]
With 28 points, Lippert was the winner of the youth classification for riders under the age of 23. Lippert led the classification from start to finish,[5] having scored points in each of the first seven races on the schedule, including her overall victory at the season-opening Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race – the only race to be held prior to the COVID-19 pandemic-enforced stoppage of racing.[14] Second place in the standings went to Mikayla Harvey with 22 points, who won the classification 3 times during the season, however her season was cut short following the disbandment of Équipe Paule Ka due to financial issues.[15] Lorena Wiebes (Team Sunweb), the defending champion of the classification, finished third, following victories in each of the final two races. For the first time, Trek–Segafredo won the teams classification, with a total of 4380.98 points and Deignan's three victories. Second place went to Boels–Dolmans, the previous winners of the classification in each of the first four years of the UCI Women's World Tour, with 3177.02 points and four victories – van der Breggen's pair of victories, Jolien D'Hoore's win at Gent–Wevelgem,[11] while Chantal van den Broek-Blaak won the Tour of Flanders.[16] Team Sunweb completed the final top three with 2876.98 points and the two victories earned by Wiebes (Three Days of Bruges–De Panne)[12] and Lippert. Other than Ceratizit–WNT Pro Cycling, Mitchelton–Scott were the other team to win during 2020 with Annemiek van Vleuten's victory at Strade Bianche.[17]
In addition, the Tour of Guangxi in China has moved from October 20 to November 10.
The leader of the UCI Women's WorldTour, Lizzie Deignan (Trek-Segafredo), was not racing herself but had enough of a lead to win the ranking ahead of teammate Longo Borghini. Lippert won the Women's WorldTour U23 ranking, wearing the light blue jersey from the first race of the season to the last.