2025 season review | Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale: French wins, Gall thrives in the Grand Tours and Seixas provides big dreams

So far in the 2025 season reviews, it feels like its been quite negative. But today, that mood will change. The 2025 season proved to be another significant chapter for the Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team. Across spring classics and three Grand Tours, they mixed steady returns with a few near-misses that kept the pressure on. This review breaks down the highs and lows of their men’s road campaign and closes with an analytical verdict on where they stand heading into 2026.

Decathlon AG2R, formed by Vincent Laven, and long known for developing homegrown talent, making smart bets on rising riders, and competing above budget. In mid-2024, Decathlon strengthened its role as primary sponsor, a public signal that the project is funded and focused for the coming cycle. The roster blended proven winners and prospects: Felix Gall as the emerging GC hope, veteran Irish fast man Sam Bennett, classics finisher Benoît Cosnefroy, plus promising French riders such as Paul Lapeira and Nicolas Prodhomme. With the team coming off a stellar 2024 that produced 30 wins and a jump up the rankings, the internal brief for 2025 was simple and demanding: keep winning often, convert more opportunities at WorldTour level, and deepen the bench so weeklong stage races and home one-days remain fertile ground.

So how did the team get on in 2025?

By season’s end, Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team amassed 26 victories across all competitions. The total fell shy of 2024’s big number, but the distribution stayed healthy: sprints, hard French one-days, and mountainous stages spread across multiple contributors.

They finished 7th in the UCI WorldTour team standings, one notch below 2024 but still in the upper tier and within touching distance of well-funded rivals. The profile of the wins told an important story about depth. Nicolas Prodhomme emerged as the most prolific individual with six victories, and the team’s 13 stage wins across the calendar kept them near the top of the peloton for pure day-by-day success.

The spring was a tale of two realities. On the cobbles and in the biggest monuments, the jersey didn’t quite bend the day. At Milano-Sanremo, their best finisher landed outside the real battle (Victor Lafay in 34th). Flanders and Roubaix also passed without a top ten, though an important bright spot arrived in Northern France when new recruit Stefan Bissegger delivered a sharp 7th at Paris–Roubaix, the team’s best result there since 2018.

Shift the lens to hillier French races, and the picture brightened immediately. In May, Benoît Cosnefroy returned from a quiet opening stretch to win the Grand Prix du Morbihan with a perfectly timed uphill kick. At Tro-Bro Léon, Bastien Tronchon and Pierre Gautherat delivered a masterclass in control on the ribinoù, breaking clear and going 1–2 in the mud. The French calendar kept paying: Aubin Sparfel won the Tour du Finistère, and the team continued their strong form.

Even so, the spring lacked a headline in the marquee Ardennes. Without Cosnefroy in April’s sharp end, the team’s best monument result was a respectable but unspectacular top 20 at Liège by Aurélien Paret-Peintre. That left a familiar takeaway: this roster routinely converts in French one-days and mid-tier terrain, but still needs a true hammer for the super-elite classics, something the transfer market would eventually try to address for 2026…

With no hardwired GC plan for May in Italy, the team chose flexibility and aggression. Sam Bennett took aim at the pure sprints, stacking top-fives but not the elusive victory he wanted. The breakthrough instead came in the high mountains from an unexpected source. Nicolas Prodhomme, more often a climbing helper, joined the right move on Stage 19 and attacked late to win at Champoluc in memorable fashion at that. It capped a breakout Giro in which he also finished 15th overall, the team’s best GC result. The group’s posture, go long, get up the road, and keep rolling the dice, felt like the right call for the personnel they brought. Mission one, bank a Grand Tour stage, was, in their words, “mission accomplished.”

At the Tour de France, the summer centerpiece reflected a shift in posture as much as results. After a winless 2024 Tour, the team arrived determined to race on the front foot with Felix Gall as clear leader. Crucially, they “freed Felix from rigid GC expectations,” favoring instinct and selective aggression over defensive marking. The payoff was a career-best 5th overall for the Austrian, earned through assertive climbing on days such as Super Bagnères and the long high-altitude efforts around the Col de la Loze. There were “a few regrets,” notably the absence of a stage win despite eight stage top-tens for Gall and a handful of close calls from others, but the overall package worked: 5th in the Tour’s team classification, Gall firmly alongside the sport’s elite, and a blueprint for how this roster can contend without a skyscraper budget.

Logic said they’d ease off after that Tour. Instead, at the Vuelta a Espana, Gall doubled up and still finished 8th overall, admitting that doing two Grand Tours in a season is “always difficult.” The final week exposed fatigue, but he held firm and joined rare company: one of only three riders to claim top-ten GC in two Grand Tours in 2025. The team time trial opening gave them early exposure, and the attitude remained positive all month, management called it “no regrets” even without a stage win, because the intent and consistency were there. Armirail again proved indispensable, all over the breaks and finishing 19th GC after nearly nicking red on Stage 6. Taken together, the Grand Tour line reads well: one stage win (Giro), two GC top-tens (5th Tour, 8th Vuelta), and an assertive identity that plays on big stages.

The market moves match the performance audit. Two headline arrivals recalibrate the classics and sprint units: Olav Kooij and Tiesj Benoot on three-year deals. Kooij’s top-end speed gives the team a pure finisher to replace Bennett, and Benoot’s experience across cobbled and hilly profiles plugs exactly the gap that spring exposed. Make no mistake, these signings from Team Visma | Lease a Bike could be crucial for the team to take the next step with big investment coming in.

The out column is meaningful too, Dorian Godon heads to Ineos Grenadiers after a season that included important wins, tireless engine Bruno Armirail joins Visma Lease a Bike, Bennett exits to Q36.5 with four wins on his way out; and Cosnefroy, after an injury-hit season, is bound for UAE Team Emirates – XRG/

There’s youth coming in behind those names. American climber Matthew Riccitello arrives to deepen the GC ladder and support Gall as the road tilts up. The development pathway remains a strength, after Paul Seixas’s successful leap, expect further promotions that keep the stage-race group robust from February to October. On balance, the moves look coherent: Kooij addresses the lack of a slam-dunk finisher, Benoot stabilises classics depth, and Riccitello helps ensure Gall isn’t isolated when the pace bites late. But still, the person I’m most excited out is young Paul Seixas.

Put simply, this was a very solid eight out of ten. The team confirmed that 2024’s jump wasn’t a blip by stacking 26 wins, finishing 7th in the WorldTour, and delivering meaningful Grand Tour outcomes. Gall’s 5th at the Tour was particularly impressive, supported by consistent day-to-day contributions across the group. The caveats are the right kind of problems: converting close calls into stage wins at the Tour, and lifting the ceiling in the super-elite one-days. Those are solvable if Kooij’s speed translates quickly and Benoot brings structure to the classics unit.

The wider trend line remains positive. Prodhomme moved from helper to habitual winner. The depth did its job across different race types and countries. The sponsor commitment mid-season was not just cosmetic, it aligns with an identity built on smart recruitment, internal promotion, and attacking intent. With “mission accomplished” at the Giro, “freed Felix from rigid GC expectations” at the Tour, “always difficult” acknowledged at the Vuelta, and “no regrets” as the season’s final word, Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team leaves 2025 with a clear sense of self and a sharper set of tools. The next step is obvious: turn a strong platform into even bigger days when the spotlight is hottest. Bring on Decathlon CMA CGM in 2026.

This season felt refreshingly positive compared to the earlier reviews I’ve done. Watching Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale in 2025, I appreciated how clearly they leaned into their strengths rather than forcing results that weren’t there. Their Giro approach paid off, their Tour run with Gall gave the team real momentum, and even the Vuelta showed how durable their depth has become in the latter stages of a gruelling year. The whole campaign felt like a team that knows what it is and where it’s going. For me, this was a convincing step forward and a season that sets an encouraging tone heading into 2026, which will be an exciting year with more investment for the team.

I wouldn't quite rate them an 8/10 this year. In the clear, it wasn't a bad season by any means, but it's hard to go above the modest line. The French team does have a high budget but over the past few years also has a history of spending it on riders that do not perform at the expected level.

This year: Sam Bennett. Whilst in 2024 there was at least the 4 Jours de Dunkerque brilliancy (was it on TV however?) this year I can't say I properly remember any of his performances, and at the Giro d'Italia where he had so many opportunities, he was simply absent. There 26 wins in total, but only 3 at World Tour level. The grand majority were in smaller French races.

That's the main sum up of Decathlon's season, they continued to focus a lot on the French calendar, where they won a lot and scored a lot of points. Good for them, it does the job and pleases the French sponsors, but even in the Grand scheme of things it's not enough to beat the teams that are around it in the UCI rankings in terms of reputation. Yes Dorian Godon's national championships win was good, but again it's a performance in France. Paul Seixas, massive revelation and potentially will aid the team in boosting its ranking next year... His European Championships result was magnificent, but again it was in France (and in all fairness, not in the team's equipment).

Seixas and Léo Bisiaux promise a lot for the future however and Nicolas Prodhomme has also had a major breakthrough as a pure climber this year. All are exciting riders to follow, and the team's future looks very bright I must say. In 2026 I see them focusing a lot more outside the French calendar, and succeeding too.

Felix Gall, lastly, is a rider I enjoy seeing quite a lot and his 5th place at the Tour de France was quite the remark for me, and well earned. The Austrian performed at his best once again and shows that a pure climber who isn't supported by a 'super team' can still go head-to-head with some of the best climbers in the world in the Grand Tours, he is part of a breed that's quickly going extinct. He didn't manage to keep it going all the way to the Vuelta but looked very strong throughout much of it and added an 8th spot there. Good enough to bring the team's level in the peloton up a notch.

Ondrej Zhasil (CyclingUpToDate)  

For Decathlon, it's relatively simple. The French team was in a transition period this year. Transiting between eras with and without Seixas. The Frenchman confirmed to us towards the end of the season that only sky will be a limit. His biggest success however didn't come in Decathlon's jersey, thus it doesn't count...

Otherwise, the team more or less performed as would be expected with Gall's Tour top-5, Prodhomme's Giro stage victory, both French national titles and a total of quite impressive 26 victories. The only downside was absence of both their star puncheurs Cosnefroy and Lafay due to recurring injuries.It was a nice, modest season for Decathlon so 7/10 is deserved. Next year, the benchmark will be much much higher though.