"I enjoy racing and for now, I'll keep going" - Chris Froome refuses to officially call time on career, but will any team sign him for 2026?

At 40 years old, with his last notable result a distant memory and his contract with Israel - Premier Tech set to expire at the end of 2025, Chris Froome remains a man at a crossroads. Yet if the sport has largely moved on from the rider who once defined a generation of Grand Tour dominance, Froome himself hasn’t quite moved on from the sport.

“It’s not easy for me — the age difference is something I definitely feel — but so far I’ve enjoyed racing alongside the younger guys,” he told Bici.Pro recently. “And for now, I’ll keep going.”

That statement — quietly delivered at the Tour de Pologne — is telling. While many expected this to be Froome’s final season, especially given his prolonged absence from the sharp end of racing since his 2019 crash, the four-time Tour de France winner has yet to definitively call time on his career. And it’s not because he’s deluding himself about a return to former glory — it’s because, in his words, he still enjoys the process.

For a rider who was once the embodiment of precision and marginal gains, Froome now finds himself on the opposite side of a cycling revolution he helped usher in. “Cycling has changed a lot, especially over the past five or six years,” he noted. “Now everything is meticulously planned — training, race data, nutrition — all calculated to the finest detail. Far more so than in my early days.”

Froome was once the vanguard of this shift, an architect of Team Sky’s systematic dominance. But the current era, driven by hyper-talented 20-somethings and wearable tech obsession, seems to have accelerated even beyond his once-clinical approach. He still turns up in a jersey and shorts while much of the peloton races in custom-moulded skinsuits. The optics say it all: a man still racing, but out of step with the world he helped create.

It would be easy to dismiss Froome as a rider hanging on too long — and some already have. His results since joining Israel - Premier Tech in 2021 have been modest at best, and his last win came in 2018. He hasn’t finished in the top 10 of any World Tour race since 2020. And with World Tour teams now operating with increasingly ruthless efficiency, it’s hard to see any top-tier squad offering him a lifeline beyond his current contract.

But to reduce Froome’s story to a decline in form would miss a deeper truth: his presence still matters. Each morning at the Tour de Pologne, he was mobbed by fans. Children, collectors, and lifelong followers queued patiently for selfies, autographs, or just a quiet moment of connection, with Froome ever obliging with the same grace that once accompanied his podium speeches in Paris, highlighting the fact his name still carries weight in the modern peloton, even if his legs can't quite produce what they used to. 

While Froome stayed non-committal about retirement, he was far more certain about what comes next. The post-racing chapter, it seems, is already in motion — and it’s a project close to his heart.

“My contract’s up at the end of this year, and I don’t know if I’ll carry on or not. But I’ve said for a long time that when I stop racing, I want to open a cycling academy in Africa,” Froome said. “I want to give young people the chance to ride and pursue a career in the sport. I believe it’s a continent on the rise — especially certain regions. Look at the marathon runners, the middle-distance guys from Ethiopia and Kenya. I think there are athletes there who could thrive in cycling too — they just haven’t had the chance.”

It’s a long-term ambition grounded in personal roots — Froome grew up in Nairobi and still speaks passionately about the potential he sees on the continent. He won’t race at next year’s World Championships in Rwanda, but said that omission doesn’t change anything. The mission now is legacy, not limelight. “My real goal is to develop a strong project — one that I’m convinced will produce some exciting new riders.”

Froome’s refusal to announce his retirement may raise eyebrows, especially with little to show in recent seasons. But for a rider who once built his career on slow-burning development and meticulous planning, the decision to step away may come only when he's absolutely sure — and not a moment before.

Whether or not he races beyond 2025, it's increasingly clear that Froome's second act won’t be written in watts or podiums, but in opportunity — the kind he once seized himself, and now hopes to offer others.

Until then, he’ll keep pedalling. “I enjoy racing,” he said. “And for now, I’ll keep going.”