Cyclist
Who are the rising stars to watch at the Tour de l’Avenir 2024?
The 2024 Tour de l’Avenir is underway. Setting out from Sarrebourg on Sunday, the race is currently making its way south to a finale atop the gravel Colle delle Finestre on Saturday 24th August.
The Tour de l’Avenir is the youngsters’ Tour de France. The race traverses France on similar roads to the elite men’s peloton and follows the same jersey conventions as the great race. For riders under the age of 23, the Tour de l’Avenir – which translates as the Tour of the Future – is the top stage race in their calendar. To add, the race is fought by national teams instead of the commercial trade teams we see at the men’s and women’s Tours de France.
Success at the Tour de l’Avenir usually points towards great things to come. In the past, climbers, sprinters and punchers alike have broken into the WorldTour on the back of Tour de l’Avenir success. Tadej Pogačar and Egan Bernal – both of whom became Tour de France champions – are among the race’s former winners. Nairo Quintana, Greg Lemond, Laurent Fignon and Miguel Induráin have also won the yellow jersey at the Tour de l’Avenir during the race’s 60-year history.
Every year, this race gives us a good glimpse at who the upcoming stars of road racing will be. Last year, Isaac del Toro became the first Mexican to win the race. A year later, he has a number of big wins including a stage victory at the Tour Down Under and a string of top tens at WorldTour races. Who could follow in the footsteps of Del Toro this year?
Jarno Widar
18-year-old Jarno Widar has stated that his ultimate goal is ‘to beat Tadej Pogačar’. Big words from a rider who is still only a teenager. However, the man from Hasselt has backed up this statement with some bullish results at the under-23 level.
Widar won the Giro Next Gen, the young riders’ Giro d’Italia, in June. At that race, he took two stages and pumped out some climbing times that easily rivals the senior peloton. Widar’s exploits are not confined to the Giro Next Gen. The young Belgian claimed overall victories at other prominent youth races at the Alpes Isère Tour and the Giro Ciclistico della Valle d’Aosta. At the latter, Widar took the GC victory by a margin of nine minutes.
On top of these GC results, Widar gained notoriety among Belgian scouts by winning the cobbled Classics of the Tour of Flanders, Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne and Nokere Koerse in his home nation. Perhaps he is the next Tadej Pogačar after all.
Signed with Lotto-Dstny until 2027, he is the next big hopeful for Belgian cycling, hoping to follow in the footsteps of the greats before him.
Mathys Rondel
Frenchman Mathys Rondel’s father was a professional speed skater. Rondel, from Le Mans in the west of France. followed suit and began his sporting career as a young talent on the ice. After making it into the French national skating team, Rondel transitioned to cycling four years ago at the age of 17 after a skating season stripped bare by the Covid pandemic.
In 2023, Rondel was scouted by Tudor Pro Cycling and later joined their development team. During 2022 and 2023, Rondel proved his athletic abilities with a podium finish at the Tour Alsace and top ten finishes at the Ronde de l’Isard and the Tour de l’Avenir. Just a teenager at this point, Rondel was punching above his weight for his young age.
At Tudor Pro Cycling, Rondel has made it onto the senior team for some top races including the Coppi e Bartali and the Tour of The Alps. At the Alpine Giro warm-up race, Rondel finished in 11th place in the general classification. This year, Rondel claimed his first major GC win at the Orlen Nations Grand Prix in Poland. Later in the year, he finished fourth at the Giro Next Gen and found his way onto the French national team for the Tour de l’Avenir as the host nation’s leader.
Much like French star of old Thibaut Pinot, Rondel is a farmer at heart. He owns a dog, a pig and chickens and hopes to house more animals at a farm he is building in the Pyrenees.
Andrew August
Andrew August – also known as AJ – has been on the Ineos Grenadiers roster for the past couple of months. He hasn’t raced any under-23 races this year, but the 18-year-old goes into the Tour de l’Avenir as one of the favourites.
The American rider from New York was scouted by the British team last summer under the promise of a huge VO2 max and watts per kilo stats. This was demonstrated in 2023 with some big results at the under-23 level including an emphatic overall win at the Ain Bugey Valmorey Tour and a runner-up finish at the highly-competitive Peace Race in the Czech Republic. He also won the American junior cyclocross championships last year and the Junior Tour of Ireland in 2022.
August snuck into the top ten at the Czech Tour won by Marc Hirschi. He also rode the Tour of the Alps, Paris-Roubaix, UAE Tour and Tour of Austria for Ineos’s senior team. He is a strong climber with a good kick on him. August will be leading the hopes of the American team that also boasts future Ineos recruit Artem Schmidt and Visma prodigy Colby Simmons.
Joe Blackmore
South London’s Joe Blackmore has been a revelation of the 2024 season. The 21-year-old began 2024 by winning the GC standings at both the Tour of Rwanda and the Tour of Taiwan. He started the season with Israel-Premier Tech’s ‘academy’ team before moving onto the senior team a couple of months later.
Blackmore has made some top-level cameos, including at the Brabantse Pijl where he finished in fourth place while on teammate duties for Dylan Teuns. Blackmore’s form continued with a win at the under-23’s Liège-Bastogne-Liège.
Blackmore is more of a Classics rider than a GC contender – and is the current gravel National Champion – but he has the potential to evolve into a well-rounded card at Israel-Premier Tech where he is contracted until 2026. At the 2024 Tour de l’Avenir, he has already shown his all-rounder prowess with a close call on the opening prologue, finishing in second place.
He is also the current European under-23 XCC mountain bike champion, so look out for him in more off-road disciplines in the years to come.
Henrik Pedersen
Already a stage winner and yellow jersey wearer, Henrik Pedersen has become a breakout star of the 2024 Tour de l’Avenir. The current European champion clinched a closely fought win on Stage 1. After a strong prologue, Pedersen went into the maillot jaune. The Dane is in pole position to win the green jersey, much like he has done in previous under-23 races.
As mentioned, Pedersen claimed a defining win at the European Championships last year on a tough course around the artificial cobbled climb VAM-berg. He has also climbed through the Danish scene by winning a handful of one-day wins in his home nation. This includes the junior national title and a top ten in the elite time-trial earlier this year.
Uno-X Mobility have also confirmed that Pedersen will move onto their elite team from 2025. The Dane will soon be a crucial figure in the Norwegian squad’s Classics goals alongside Jonas Abrahamsen, Alexander Kristoff and Magnus Cort.
Gal Glivar
Gal Glivar is hotly tipped by Slovenian journalists to become the nation’s next big star. After Roglič and Pogačar, we expect to see Slovenian Glivar raising his arms at a Grand Tour in the next decade.
Glivar is not aiming for the yellow jersey, however. He is a hardy rider capable of winning reduced sprints and Classics. He has pointed out his aspirations to win Liège-Bastogne-Liège in the future for instance.
Now 22 years of age and signed onto the UAE Team Emirates development squad, Glivar has enjoyed some big successes at the under-23 level. In 2023, he took the overall title at the Carpathian Couriers Race and the Orlen Nations Grand Prix. This year already, he has won the Giro del Belvedere and the Tour of Shajarah. At the ongoing 2024 Tour de l’Avenir, Glivar has scored a top-three finish on Stage 1’s rolling profile. Look out for him in the green of Slovenia on Stage 5 to come.
Matthew Brennan
One of the brightest sprinting talents in the under-23 scene, Matthew Brennan of Great Britain has a great future ahead of him. Born in August 2005, Brennan has just turned 19. The rider from County Durham in the north of England comes from a track background. He transitioned onto the road in 2022 with the Fensham Howes-MAS Design squad.
The Visma-Lease a Bike development rider has scored some big wins at the beginning of the year. Brennan doubled up in Croatia with sprint victories at the Trofej Umag and Trofej Poreč, emulating the palmarès of teammate Olav Kooij.
At the Giro Next Gen, Brennan took the final stage to Forlimpopoli. He also rode a consistent Orlen Nations Grand Prix, finishing in the top six on all five stages. During the 2024 season, Brennan also stepped up to the senior Visma-Lease a Bike team during the spring. With the squad, Brennan finished in third place at the Circuit de Wallonie behind top sprinters Alex Zingle and Arnaud de Lie and rode to the top ten at the Rund um Köln.
In steady fashion, Brennan has already finished within the top five on three occasions at the Tour de l’Avenir, even on the tougher punchy profiles.
Other riders to watch
The 2024 Tour de l’Avenir is packed with young talents already signed onto WorldTour teams are embedded within top flight development teams. UAE Team Emirates rider and spring Classics breakout star António Morgado of Portugal stars in the Tour de l’Avenir. Morgado became the youngest rider to reach the top ten at a Monument in 80 years. 18-year-old stage winner from the Giro Next Gen Pablo Torres will lead Spanish hopes. He is currently contracted to UAE Team Emirates’ development team.
Peace Race winner Brieuc Rolland will support Rondel’s chances for France. The Groupama-FDJ rider finished in second place at Liège-Bastogne-Liège and the Orlen Nations Grand Prix this year. Another WorldTour rider, Ineos’s Michael Leonard has already won a stage of the Tour de l’Avenir for Canada in the opening day’s prologue. He beat Sweden’s Lidl-Trek rider Jakob Söderqvist to first that day.
A wildcard to watch will be Pavel Novák of the Czech Republic. He won the Trofeo Piva and placed fifth overall at the Giro Next Gen back in June. He was previously enlisted to Q36.5 and is in the hunt for an elite contract for 2025.
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