The 40 Most Interesting Riders in Cycling, Year 2, Part 2
Riders 34 through 29, including a huge name
No throat-clearing today. It’s Christmas Eve. Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, and a pleasant Tuesday to the culturally irreligious among you.
Here’s the preseason Top 41 Most Interesting Riders list from 2024, here’s Part 1 of this year’s edition, so you know what this is all about.
34. Jonas Vingegaard, 28, Visma-Lease a Bike, Denmark, GC Specialist
Wow, this is a real slap in the face to the two-time Tour de France winner, and consensus best pure GC rider in the peloton. The 30s on this list usually isn’t a place for stars of this caliber; it’s where I take fliers on cyclocrossers and crit racers, and get over my skis for a young rider based on one or two pretty solid results. Every other rider I would consider capable of winning a non-fluky grand tour title this year—male or female—is at least 10 spots higher on this list. Vingegaard’s three main rivals are all in the top 11. What do I have against this guy?
Well, there’s nothing wrong with him. The palest athlete on Earth is a monster rider; his distant second-place finish at this year’s Tour de France was marked by efforts that would’ve been record-setting had Tadej Pogačar not spent all summer in Bullet Time. And all this despite coming off a really nasty crash at the Tour of the Basque Country, and being without Sepp Kuss at the Tour—all told, Vingegaard has nothing to be ashamed of.
But when I called him a “pure GC rider” I mean he’s the apotheosis of the form. Consistent power, perfect for ITTs and long mountain climbs. Smart, cool-headed, good at altitude and in the heat. Nearly unbeatable when surrounded by a great team.
However—and this is just my opinion, so feel free to yell if you like—that kind of rider has always bored me. Vingegaard is so metronomic he’s mostly interesting when placed in narrative opposition to someone with a more interesting story: Usually, Pogačar, sometimes Kuss, sometimes Primož Roglič.
When he was the guy who deposed Roglič within his own team? Fascinating. When he upset the balance of Visma-Lease a Bike by brushing up against the limits of attacking Kuss at the Vuelta? Shakespearean. When he was the only man capable of beating Pogačar over three weeks? Compelling.
But the 2024 Tour—acknowledging concerns about fitness and team strength—was an embarrassment for Vingegaard. Second place and a stage win is a good showing for almost anyone. But not when Pogačar won six stages and took GC by more than six minutes, trouncing Vingegaard in the one narrow set of circumstances that favored the Dane.
Heading into last season, Pogačar was approaching so-dominant-it’s-boring territory for me. Then he called his shot by attempting and then winning the Triple Crown. In that environment, sorry, Jonas, there are no free rides. You’ve got to show me something more.
33. Marc Hirschi, 26, Tudor Pro Cycling, Switzerland, Puncheur
Hirschi was 31st on last year’s list, and barely moved. Here’s part of what I wrote about him then:
[Winning La Flèche Wallonne and nearly winning Liège-Bastogne-Liège in 2020] got Hirschi a big-money move from Sunweb (now DSM) to UAE, where he was set up to become the team’s leader in the hilly classics. And it just never happened. Pogačar just absorbed that role as well, becoming nearly unbeatable over moderate terrain, and now we’re left wondering if Hirschi just cashed in on one incredible six-week run.
The end of the 2023 season brought some renewed signs of life for the young Swiss rider; after Worlds in August, Hirschi finished in the top 10 in every race he entered except Il Lombardia. Which, I’ll concede, is a big one.
This is a make-or-break year for Hirschi, whose contract at UAE is up at season’s end, and so far the biggest win he’s had in that team’s colors was the Tour de Luxembourg, which is fine, but doesn’t match expectations.
Well, I don’t know if Hirschi has climbed back up to elite puncheur territory—insofar as that’s possible now that Pogačar has basically eaten that category of racing as well—but you can’t say he wasn’t productive in 2024. He didn’t appear in any of the grand tours, and while he raced every monument except Paris-Roubaix he wasn’t competitive in any of them. (Though UAE would’ve been focused on Pogačar in Milan-San Remo, LBL and Il Lombardia, so results can be deceiving.)
Nevertheless, Hirschi won eight races, including a couple big ones: Donostia San Sebastian Klasikoa and Bretagne Classic. Plus he finished second at Amstel Gold, where he got outsprinted by Tom Pidcock.
Having foundered as a medium-sized fish in a big pond, Hirschi’s rehoming himself, joining the exodus to Swiss second-division team Tudor.1 These teams rely on wild cards for entry into big races, so they usually brand themselves for a particular type of race: Cobbled classics, sprinting, stage hunting, what have you. Tudor’s put up an interesting-looking core of a hilly classics team built around Hirschi and Julian Alaphilippe. Plus holdovers Matteo Trentin and Michael Storer, who rode with Hirschi at Sunweb when they were youths.
I couldn’t think of a more different environment from the glitzy and high-flying UAE, but it’s not a million miles away from where Hirschi thrived as a young pro.
32. Kim Cadzow, 23, EF-Oatly-Cannondale, New Zealand, Climber
This is me putting down a couple bucks on a longshot.2 Cadzow is…I wouldn’t call her a supporting player on EF, but she’s not the team’s biggest star. This year, I’d expect more of the same flat-ground monster truck action from Alison Jackson and Kristen Faulkner, and for French newcomer Cédrine Kerbaol to be the team’s big GC threat.
But last season, Cadzow kept popping up amongst much bigger names. I’ll give you two. At Liège-Bastogne-Liège, Cadzow got into the break, then was able to stick with the favorites once the break got caught. Cadzow hung on until the final sprint—despite nearly yard-saling through a traffic circle in the final 10 kilometers—where she finished sixth.
Then she finished seventh in the Olympic time trial, which doesn’t sound like much, but while 91 seconds separated gold and silver in that race, just 42 seconds separated second from 10th. Cadzow, who pushed off relatively early, put in a white-hot final sector to claim the hot seat until the top nine seeds came along. Until then I’d kind of written her off as a climber who’d get blown over in a stiff breeze, but that was a great performance in tough conditions for a rider whose bikehandling and hitherto been considered a weaknesss. Maybe there’s more to come.
31. Ben Healy, 24, EF Education-EasyPost, Ireland, Puncheur
Another recidivist in the 30s. Healy was huge in 2023—well, he was little, but he had some big results. A Giro d’Italia stage win, second at both Brabantse Pijl and Amstel Gold, and victories at Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali and the Irish national road race championship.
In 2024, Healy spent a lot of time attacking and chasing but had little to show for it. Life can be hard for a rider who specializes in a discipline Pogačar dominates, but I’ll give you an example: Healy suited up for his first Tour de France in 2024, and five times he spent at least 97 kilometers in a break. The only one of those breaks that made it to the end came on Stage 9, and it was a brutal matchup for Healy. The young Irishman came to the final sprint with Pidcock, Alexey Lutsenko, and three guys—Derek Gee, Alex Aranburu, and eventual winner Anthony Turgis—who are basically sprinters. Tough break.
I put Healy back here because EF can be a really interesting team in the grand tours. Their GC leader, Richard Carapaz, is in that awkward middle ground where he’s probably not good enough to win another grand tour but he’s way better over three weeks than anyone outside the top four. And even after some huge free agent losses—Stefan Bissegger, Alberto Bettiol, Simon Carr—and the doping expulsion of Andrea Piccolo,3 EF can roll out a really competitive stage-hunting roster.
And without Bettiol, and with Neilson Powless coming off an indifferent 2024 campaign, Healy is really the guy now. Carapaz is the face of the team, but Healy—whether it’s in the hilly classics or in the grand tours—is the EF rider capable of delivering the biggest actual result.
30. Josh Tarling, 20, Ineos Grenadiers, Great Britain, Time Trialist
Big man go fast. Big man create big expectations. Big man finish fourth at both worlds and Olympics. Big man suffer flat tire at Olympics. Very sad.
Big man’s expectations even bigger without Pidcock in team. All eyes on big man.
29. Arnaud de Lie, 22, Lotto, Belgium, Classics Specialist
I got a little carried away about de Lie last summer. I thought he was a lock for the Tour de France green jersey.
He ended up sixth in the points classification, having finished no higher than third on any individual stage. Nevertheless, I want to run it back. He’s still so young, and so powerful, that a big result is coming soon.
Which, I learned by watching Formula 1, is a watch company
I’ve never actually bet on horse racing before but I think that’s how it works.
Hey, man, just a piece of advice, try not to piss hot while you’re working for the ostentatiously anti-doping team.