The Tour de France and the Tour de France Femmes are the two largest races of the year for cycling fans and racers alike.
To emerge victorious and take home the most iconic jersey, the yellow one, in the sport, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) and Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM) had to out-ride and out-smart their competitors for 3,498km and 948km, respectively.
Both Tours de France sport the season's most competitive fields, most prestigious and also, the largest prize purse. However, there is a big difference in what Pogačar took home in comparison with Niewiadoma.
Now in its second year, the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift has €250,000 (£213,000/$277,000) of prize money in total, with the overall winner taking home €50,000, second taking €25,000 and third place earning €10,000. This prize pool makes the Tour de France Femmes the highest-paying race on the Women's WorldTour calendar. And while this is a significant step forward for women's racing, it still pales in comparison to the men's Tour.
The men's Tour de France has €2.4 million of prize money in total, of which Pogačar took home the €500,000 (£423,000/$554,000) grand prize - double the entire prize pool of the Tour de France Femmes.
Or, to put it in Euros per kilometre raced, the 2023 men's Tour winner was paid €142.94 per km while the women's winner earned €52.7 per km.
At the end of the Tour, his stage placings and days in yellow also rewarded, Pogačar won a total of €650,000. As the overall Tour de France Femmes winner, Niewiadoma earned less than a tenth of that.
Niewiadoma did not win any stages along the way, so did not bump up her take-home win bonus anymore that way, but did collect extra from finishing in the top-20 on stages four, five, six, seven and eight, as well as placing high up in the other classifications.
Classifications and Stage Earnings:
- In the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, an individual stage win paid out €4,000 versus €11,000 in the men's Tour.
- The points classification was won by Biniam Girmay (Intermarché-Wanty) in the men's race and Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) in the women's Tour. Girmay took home €25,000 and an additional €300 every day he wore the green jersey. Vos, in comparison, took home €3,000 and an additional €100 for every stage she topped the points classification.
- For the mountains and best young rider classifications, the men's winners earned €25,000 and €20,000, respectively - that's Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) and Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step). As well as an additional €300 for every day they wore the respective jerseys. The women's QOM and best young riders earned €3,000 and an additional €100 for every stage they wear the jersey - Justine Ghekiere (AG Insurance-Soudal) and Puck Pieterse (Fenix-Deceuninck), respectively. This means the three jersey winners in the men's race earned over eight times the amount of money that the jersey winners of the women's Tour earned.
- Further earnings go to the team with the best performances. The team's classification is calculated by a team's three highest-placed riders and was won by UAE Team Emirates in the men's Tour, netting the team €50,000. Lidl-Trek earned €6,000, in comparison, in the Femmes.
- Finally, the rider awarded the most combative prize in the men's Tour earned €20,000. This year it was won by Carapaz. In the women's Tour, Demi Vollering (SD Worx-Protime), who finished in second, received the honours, adding an additional €2,000 to her Tour winnings.
