The protagonists
Rider profiles
The men who decide the Tour: what they win on, where they crack, and who they measure themselves against.
Profiles
Leading riders
Slovenia
Tadej Pogačar
All-rounder / puncheur
The defining rider of his generation: a climber who sprints, a time triallist who attacks from 60 km out, and the only man since Merckx to win Grand Tours and Monuments in the same breath. His racing instinct — going early, going often — has rewritten how the modern Tour is contested.
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Denmark
Jonas Vingegaard
Climber / stage racer
A former fish-market packer turned two-time Tour champion. Vingegaard races on numbers and patience: a metronomic climber with a devastating late-race kick, backed by the most tactically disciplined team in the peloton.
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Belgium
Remco Evenepoel
Time triallist / stage racer
A former Belgium youth international footballer who became the best time triallist of his era. Evenepoel builds his Tours out of the race against the clock and defends in the high mountains, and has stood on the Paris podium since 2024.
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Netherlands
Mathieu van der Poel
Classics rider / puncheur
Grandson of Raymond Poulidor, and the man who finally put the family in yellow. Van der Poel treats the Tour's first week as a series of one-day races, hunting the maillot jaune on cobbles, crosswinds and short walls.
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Belgium
Wout van Aert
Rouleur / all-terrain
The most versatile engine in the peloton: green jersey winner, mountain stage winner, time trial winner — sometimes in the same Tour. Increasingly a super-domestique whose work on the flat and in the valleys sets up Visma's mountain attacks.
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Slovenia
Primož Roglič
Stage racer
A former junior ski-jumping world champion who came to cycling at 22 and collected four Vueltas, a Giro and an Olympic time trial title. The Tour remains the great unfinished business after 2020's La Planche des Belles Filles.
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Belgium
Jasper Philipsen
Sprinter
The fastest finisher of the modern Tour, launched by the best leadout in the sport. Philipsen's green jersey in 2023 came with four stage wins and a masterclass in positioning inside the final kilometre.
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Eritrea
Biniam Girmay
Sprinter / puncheur
The first Black African rider to win a Tour de France stage, and in 2024 the first to win the green jersey. Girmay's success turned him into a national event in Eritrea and reshaped the sport's map.
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