Tour de France 2023: the changing British contingent

The 2023 Tour de France marks the 10 year anniversary of Chris Froome’s first yellow jersey victory. Since then, the United Kingdom has established itself as a primary fighting force in world cycling. Nonetheless, many of the characters of the last decade are not here at this Tour de France.

Chris Froome is the big omission, as GCN reported earlier this week, but also absent are the other two British Tour winners, with Bradley Wiggins long retired now and Geraint Thomas staying home to recover from his Giro d’Italia. The maturation is pretty stark when you consider the age of the British riders going to this year’s race. Out of the seven starters, Mark Cavendish is the only name on this list that is over 31 years old and he is in his last Tour this year.

While the stalwarts of the British contingent on Tour might be fading away, or doing one last lap around France, the riders here are still more than capable of making a big impact on the race. Furthermore, the Yates twins have morphed from precocious young talents into seasoned and accomplished winners and will be sure to play big roles in the mountains of this year's race. Check out who  the British riders heading to the start in Bilbao Saturday are and what you can expect from this year’s crop of riders flying the Union Flag.

Mark Cavendish (Astana-Qazaqstan)

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Stage number 34 for Mark Cavendish in the 2021 Tour de France

The 2023 Tour de France will be the last time British fans will cheer on the Manx Missile, but it is far from a ceremonial last lap around France. Cavendish, whether he wants to talk about it or not, is just one win away from being the out-right all-time Tour stage win record holder, beating Eddy Merckx’s record. Cavendish’s quest for win number 35 is the biggest sub-plotline during this Tour de France, and with no true British contender for the overall win – more on that later – the public will be fully behind one last dance with Cavendish. At the Tour, even one that is very heavy on the climbing, Cavendish still has a pull that puts him close to the centre of attention.

Is it too much to expect one win? No, it is not. While Cavendish does not have the team around him that he has had in his most successful years, he proved that he can still come good at a Grand Tour once already this year with his victory on the final day of the Giro d’Italia. In fact, the difficulty of this year’s Tour may favour Cavendish in his pursuit. Later in the race, and possibly on the very last day on the Champs-Élysées, the sprint field might be diminished and the path to a victory could be clearer.

Tom Pidcock (Ineos Grenadiers)

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Tom Pidcock descending the Galibier last year at the Tour de France

Pidcock is back to the Tour after his daredevil victory on the Alpe d’Huez stage last year and he will be certainly hoping to add to that stage win tally. Pidcock will have free reign to take on the Tour in whatever way he would like with his team, Ineos Grenadiers, starting the race without a top contender for the final podium. Pidcock is one of a dozen or so riders who could squeak into the Tour top 10, or focus on a stage win. While Pidcock will certainly want a crack at riding GC in the near future, this year he has the opportunity to chase a bit of both of these objectives, while not having to put too much stock into either endeavour.

At least one stage win seems in order for the punchy all-rounder. From stage 1 to stage 19, this Tour de France is chock full of opportunities for a versatile rider with a fast finishing kick. Pidcock had a strong spring campaign and while he was foiled in races like Amstel Gold Race and Liège-Bastogne-Liège, it is unlikely he will have to face the riders who beat him there in the Tour breakaways, namely Tadej Pogačar and Remco Evenepoel. Nonetheless, in pre race comments, Pidcocks told GCN he is hoping to win stages from the lead group and not breakaways, which means he will have to square up against Pogačar and Vingegaard. That being said, in the meat of this Tour, there are opportunities for Pidcock to feast.

Adam Yates (UAE Team Emirates)

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Adam Yates off the front with Jonas Vingegaard at the Critérium du Dauphiné

Adam Yates is starting his seventh Tour and is coming into the race looking like he is at his absolute best. From a second-place finish behind Jonas Vingegaard at the Dauphiné, to winning the Tour de Romandie, Yates is humming. After an off-season swap from Ineos Grenadiers to UAE Team Emirates, Yates will be asked to use that form to help support Tadej Pogačar take on Vingegaard over the three weeks of racing in France. While the gap between Yates’ level and Vingegaard’s was clear at the Dauphiné, that gap might be close enough for Pogačar to have a foil, à la Roglič in last year's Tour, and stretch Vingegaard and Jumbo-Visma beyond one-on-one showdowns

The conversation around Adam Yates has been one of the hottest post-Dauphiné discussions in the lead up to the Tour. The week-long pre-Tour dress rehearsal generally saw riders hit their expectations or lag behind in performance, with the exception of a couple of standout performances. One was Adam Yates who was clearly the second strongest climber in the race. As we know from years past at the UAE Tour, these longer climbing performances are not an anomaly. The question on the front of everyone’s mind is how can UAE use Yates’ form most effectively when paired with Tadej Pogačar.

While it is tempting to consider the option of UAE keeping Yates in podium contention throughout the whole race and rolling the dice in the crucial final week, that strategy could backfire. Yates’ best Tour finish was in 2016 when he finished fourth, over four minutes back. Since then, his ceiling has seemed to be finishing in the top ten. That is still valuable, but with a Tadej Pogačar victory that would be most likely forged through small gains and stage time bonuses, having Yates function as a distracting foil in the races early days to draw out Jumbo-Visma before Pogačar takes bit of time throughout the first two weeks might be worth Yates shipping time. Even if he is down on GC, his presence in assisting Pogačar can make the difference, especially if Pogačar is already in yellow.

Fred Wright (Bahrain Victorious)

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Mads Pederson leading Fred Wright during a breakaway at last year’s Tour. Pederson would go on to beat Wright at the finish.

Take a look at Fred Wright’s racing CV from the last couple of years there are lots of single digit results. From top-10 finishes at the Tour of Flanders, to second places on stage of the 2022 Tour and 2022 Vuelta a España, Wright has been knocking on the door of victory since he began to break through during the latter half of the 2021 season. Finally, after many close calls and strong showings, Wright got his first professional victory at last weekend’s British national road race championships when he claimed the jersey in a dragged fight around a soaked Saltburn-by-the-Sea circuit. With a win finally under his belt, could this Tour be the moment that Wright makes the next step up?

Cycling, like other sports, plays upon momentum and motivation. Coming off the back of his championship victory, Wright will have plenty of momentum. Motivation, for everyone at Bahrain-Victorious, will certainly be high after Gino Mäder’s tragic death at the Tour de Suisse, with the likes of Jack Haig, Mikel Landa, Phil Bauhaus and Matej Mohorič providing opportunities for the team to chase that emotional victory that the team and neutral spectators will be pulling for. Wright, with his strength and versatility, will be keen on honouring his teammate with a win for him.

Simon Yates (Jayco-AlUla)

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Simon Yates won stage 14 at the 2022 Giro d’Italia after injuries took him out of GC contention

Simon Yates is a bit like a box of chocolates: you never know what you’re going to get. For every high high of the 30-year-old’s career is a draining low that makes Simon Yates one of the most enigmatic figures in cycling. While he is a Grand Tour winner after his triumph in the 2018 Vuelta a España, he is also the same rider who that very year dropped like a stone after commanding the 2018 Giro d’Italia. Just last year, he pushed Primoz Roglič to the brink of failure in Paris-Nice, before dropping like a stone from GC contention at the Giro when the race turned up at Blockhaus at the end of the first week. Nonetheless, by the next week, Yates was again looking like a world-beater with his solo victory in Turin. He rises, he falls. The only truly predictable thing about Yates is that he, typically, defies predictions.

Simon Yates comes into the Tour with not only a long-term history of up and down results, but also a short-term history that is largely blank. Yates has not raced since he pulled out of stage 1 of the Tour de Romandie in late April due to stomach issues. Our last true impressions of the Jayco-AlUla talisman were good. At the Tour Down Under, Paris-Nice and the Tour of the Basque Country, Yates finished in the GC top 10, with a stage win to boot on the final day of the Tour Down Under. But that is a long time from now and extrapolating over such a long period is a tricky proposition. With the uncertainty and lack of racing, a high position in the Tour GC for Simon Yates is unlikely. What is much more likely, and what could almost be expected, is a stage win from a breakaway late in the race, adding to his two stage wins from 2019.

Ben Turner (Ineos Grenadiers)

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Ben Turner at the E3 Harelbeke after returning from his injuries after a crash at Omloop Het Nieusblad

Ben Turner is one of two Brits making their debut at the 2023 Tour de France and he is something of a surprise selection for the Ineos Grenadiers Tour squad. In Ben Turner’s case, this surprise is not for a lack of strength and potential, but for a lack of racing. Turner, who was one of the revelations of last year’s Spring Classics, crashed out of both the Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and the Tour of Flanders with broken bones. Since Flanders at the beginning of April, Turner has only started one race, the Dauphiné, which he did not finish after crashing, yet again, in the stage 4 time trial. Despite the crashes, Turner will line up the Tour as a part of an unorthodox Ineos Grenadiers set-up to discover what his potential might be at the world's biggest bike race.

With the tumult of Turner’s season up until this point and the class of the other names on the Ineos Grenadiers start list, expectations from the team and from British fans should be fairly tempered. Turner is certainly a talent for the future and this will not be his last start at the Tour de France, but this is not a year where that talent is likely to bear fruits. Yet, at 1.94m tall with a well rounded profile, Turner will be worth his weight in gold as a domestique and will be used to help Dani Martínez, Carlos Rodríguez and Egan Bernal scrape together GC placings, while Tom Pidcock and Omar Fraile chase stage victories.

James Shaw (EF Education-Easypost)

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James Shaw at the finish of Strade Bianche

Fellow Tour de France debutant James Shaw comes in as one of the more heartwarming stories of determination in this year’s race. The 27-year-old will be taking to the start line for EF Education-EasyPost on Saturday, but came close to giving up the sport in recent years as he fell out of favour on the WorldTour. Having signed for Lotto Soudal following a promising junior career, Shaw made a name for himself as a dependable teammate in the hills, though a lack of wins saw Shaw deemed surplus to requirements following the 2018 season. Offered a lifeline in February 2019 by British squad SwiftCarbon, Shaw repaid his dues on the domestic circuit before continuing his revival with Riwal Readynez in 2020 and Ribble Weldtite in 2021. Now in his second campaign with Jonathan Vaughters’ American squad, Shaw is proving his worth with the world’s elite once again, picking up a top 10 on stage 12 of last year’s Vuelta a España before finishing runner-up on GC at this year’s Coppi e Bartali.

A more than capable climber, Shaw comes to the Tour as valuable support for EF’s trio of Richard Carapaz, Rigoberto Urán and Neilson Powless. The occasional opportunity may reveal itself to stamp his mark on the race in a breakaway, but expect Shaw to be on domestique duties for the majority of the race. For Shaw, however, taking to the start of his first Tour de France will be a victory in itself following his long road back to the sport’s top tier.

Britain will be happy hunting for stages at this Tour

While there is no true yellow jersey contender for this year's British line-up at the Tour, there is lots to be excited about for this group of riders on this route. From the word go, there will be opportunities for one of the seven to end up raising their arms aloft at the finish of each stage. For four of the seven riders – Cavendish, Pidcock, Wright and Simon Yates – finishing the Tour without a stage win would probably be seen as a disappointment. Each of those riders, realistically, can hope for multiple stages. For Adam Yates, the operative goal will be yellow for the team in Paris, and even, if things go down the best possible path, a podium finish in Paris. A Brit may not win the whole thing this year, but they’ll certainly hope to leave a mark.