“I might not quite be good enough” - Key signing in INEOS rebuild admits he'd rather avoid the Tour de France in 2027
Cycling
When the Netcompany INEOS Cycling Team last won the Tour de France, Egan Bernal and Geraint Thomas stood together on the podium in Paris. Seven years later, Thomas is directing a rebuild and the team have just come through a Tour without a stage win. Michael Valgren, one of the riders they’ve brought in for 2027, would leave the race off his first INEOS programme if the choice were his.
“I’ve ridden nine Tours now, and of course I’d love to win a stage,” Valgren told TV 2 Sport. “But I’ve had nine goes and it hasn’t happened yet. So I’d rather ride the Giro than the Tour.”
In July, an injury to Oscar Onley before the start had left INEOS chasing stages at the Tour. The team came closest in the opening time trial in Barcelona, missing out by eight seconds. The sponsor’s ambition is to take them back to the top of a race they won seven times in eight editions.
Valgren’s experience of the two Grand Tours has left him with a different calculation about where he can do his best racing.
“There’s a slightly better chance of the breakaway staying away and of winning a stage or getting a result,” he said of the Giro d’Italia. “The Tour is so big and so hard, and I might not quite be good enough to get a chance of my own there. Especially at INEOS.”
Valgren won a stage of the Giro d'Italia in 2026
Tirreno and the Giro changed Valgren’s plans
Valgren had already had a chance to win a Giro stage in Lucca in 2024, when Benjamin Thomas outsprinted him from a four-man break. He had to wait another two years for his first win since 2021. It came at Tirreno-Adriatico in March, when he dropped Julian Alaphilippe on the final climb and held off the favourites into Mombaroccio.
By May he was back in a Giro breakaway. At Andalo, a lull inside the final kilometre gave him just enough time to jump from the back of the group. Andreas Leknessund came after him, but Valgren held on by three seconds and crossed the line holding up the green Poké Ball his son had made for him.
“If I hadn’t won those races this year and hadn’t been riding so well, I’d probably have adjusted my ambitions and taken a slightly different path for the last few years of my career,” he said. “I might have become a luxury domestique. I’m not there yet.”
When Valgren fractured his pelvis and badly injured his knee at the Route d’Occitanie in 2022, his route back to the WorldTour took him through a season with the EF development team. He leaves the EF Education-EasyPost set-up after six years, with two wins in his final season and two familiar faces coming with him. James Shaw and Markel Beloki are also moving from EF to INEOS.
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Where Valgren fits in the INEOS rebuild
Thomas sees a place for Valgren in the Classics group. The Dane won Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Amstel Gold Race in the same spring with Astana in 2018. He was 26 then. Eight years on, the appeal of the move is what he thinks the team can still get out of him.
“I’ve always been fascinated by their approach to the sport,” Valgren said. “So when the opportunity came up, I didn’t have to think about it for long. It was really just a matter of saying yes and signing the contract.”
He described it as “joining a proper big team again” and said he hoped INEOS could help him find “those extra few per cent you’re always looking for and hoping to find”. He added, “I’m sure they can help me with that.”
“They really try to find those gains that can make you better, and I can see things I can improve myself,” he said. “It’s just a matter of putting them into practice and making them part of my routine.”
Valgren will be 36 by the end of the two-year deal INEOS announced in October. “Let’s see how it goes at INEOS now,” he said. “Whether the next two years are as good as the last two, and whether I feel like carrying on after that. Or whether I need to take a different approach depending on where I’m at, whether it’s time to start riding for others or to throw in the towel and say I’ve had enough.”
His first Grand Tour with INEOS is still to be confirmed. The first chance to see where he fits in Thomas’s rebuild could come months before either the Giro or the Tour, on the roads where he made his name.
Kieran WoodDeputy Editor-in-Chief
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He regularly contributes to DartsNews.com and CyclingUpToDate.com, where he covers professional cycling and darts. In cycling, his work includes liveblogs from major races, including the Tour de France, the Giro d’Italia, and La Vuelta a España, alongside race reports and analysis. He has also conducted interviews with professional riders.
His reporting spans the full racing calendar, from one-day classics to stage races, with a focus on accurate, real-time coverage and clear contextual analysis. For statistics, results, and historical context, he regularly uses resources such as ProCyclingStats. To support reporting on rider activity and training context where relevant, he also references Strava.
In his work, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles as new, verified information becomes available.
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- they have no expertise with classics, they have no leaders in classics. the classics is dominated by the few Fuori Classe riders where other riders are left with scraps. the Hiring , the salaries dont make sense at all. Same problem as Man Utd. over paid players, egos, very little performanceabstractengineer13-11-2026
- Contract year means you gotta win, at least collect UCI points, helping be damnedabstractengineer13-11-2026
- Arensman is their best rider and he is paid very less in comparisonabstractengineer13-11-2026
- I'm not trying to argue with you but if you didn't see Del Toro struggling in the Tour I'll pay for some glasses for you lol. He struggled so much that Tadej missed winning stage 15, Tadej also dropped the pace along some stages to help Del Toro hold onto the podium. Now he may have been sick, that is a possibility, but he definitely struggled. You have a nice weekend as well brother.awp13-11-2026
- Im not copmaring him to jonas palmares...but current level of power and again like you even pointed out 19sec difference and on other ocassions del toro dropping him. Its evidently their close and based on both their different trajectory its self explanatory...where we are next year.And Del Toro didnt struggle if getting a podium in his first TDF at 22 year old is struggling you sure dont know how to be objective haha. But have a good weekend this is so dumb to discuss as its not even a discussin in reality as facts speak for themselves of what were actually speaking of - and self explanatory.miguel13-11-2026
- fingers crossed. my son has a poster of wout and mathieu battling each other at the beach at ostend up in his room. would be great to see them again there!Ketterechts13-11-2026
- This Giro is very strange in it's circular route. If you were to have stage starting in Trieste and ending atop Monte Zoncolan (end stage 20) you'd get a stage only 145 km long
Rafionain-Glas13-11-2026 - When Thomas gets the bullet from INEOS he can get a job as a comedian.
Senna196013-11-2026 - Right on. The more the merrier.Occam13-11-2026
- Remember, Del Toro struggled in this Tour. He is great, no doubt about that, but comparing him to a four time gt winner is absurd at this point. He has the potential. We'll have to see how he develops.awp13-11-2026
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