Elisa Longoborghini (Trek-Segafredo) thought she had lost the battle for the overall Women's Tour win in the first intermediate sprint of stage 6, but the team convinced the Italian champion to focus on the stage finish. However, the team convinced the Italian champion to focus on the stage finish, and in the final stage, the team used strong teamwork to push Longo Borghini to win the sprint for the time bonus.

Longo Borghini started stage 6 in the same time as yellow jersey Grace Brown (FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope), but misjudged the timing of her sprint in the first intermediate sprint, and Brown, her lead-out, Audrey Cordon-Lago and Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM), and Longo Borghini lost three seconds to Brown. "Okay, now I'm in second place. But all my teammates said, 'Let's go for it at the finish, let's do the lead-out.' I was really skeptical, but seeing the team so motivated and believing in me, I wanted to give it all back to them," Longo Borghini said.

The Trek-Segafredo team had seen the finish line before the stage and knew the 30-year-old Italian had a chance to close the three-second gap.

"We knew the finale was pretty technical and we studied it this morning with (director) Ina Toitenberg. So I think in the end people believed I could do it because of the corners. But also I have to give a big thanks to my team Trek Segafredo," said Longo Borghini.

"Yesterday, Lizzie (Deignan) sent me a nice message and told me not to forget my sprint in 2019. I had another close race with Kasia Nyeviadma and she came through.

Deignan, now out of the race, won the 2019 Women's Tour by 2 seconds over Niewiadoma after starting the final stage with the same time.

On a technical run-in to Oxford, Trek-Segafredo lined up at the front of the peloton, with four riders surrounding Longo Borghini at the 2km mark.

Four turns and a short climb with 1km to go showed Longo-Borghini's strength, and after the first turn on Flamme Rouge, Cordon-Lago led the Italian champion.

"In the end, everyone did a perfect job," Longo-Borghini said of his teammates.

"We drafted some guys and I did my sprints. It was a great team effort and I really appreciate all of my teammates and the staff working for me. I was able to show how much teamwork is worth in cycling."

Longo Borghini, who had done well in the turns, crossed the finish straight in second place behind Clara Copponi (FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope). Lorena Wiebes (Team DSM) passed them both to take the win.

Longo Borghini did not know where her rivals were: "At that point, I just wanted to get bonus seconds," she said.

And so she did: Copponi finished second, but Longo Borghini held off a late charge by Tereza Neumanover (Liv Racing-Stra) to take third place, and the four bonus seconds gave her a one second lead over Brown on the final GC, 19 hours After more than a race, she won the 2022 Women's Tour by a narrow margin.