"I was ready to put myself at his service": Bryan Coquard left out of Tour de France team; targets Vuelta a España stage win

Bryan Coquard is currently in Spain, preparing for his fourteenth season in the professional peloton. While the WorldTour begins this week in Australia, the Cofidis rider, whose team is now operating at the ProTeam level, is finalizing his winter training in Europe.

Speaking to DirectVelo, the Frenchman outlined a diverse calendar that includes a detour to Greece, a break from the Tour de France, and a renewed focus on the Vuelta a España.

Despite having won a stage in the Adelaide region as recently as 2025, Coquard is not present at the Tour Down Under this January. "In any case, I hadn't planned to go to Australia this year," Coquard confirmed regarding his absence from the season opener.

Coquard will pin on a race number later this month, kicking off his campaign in Spain on January 24 and 25 at the Classica Comunitat Valenciana and the Gran Premio Castellón. These are familiar roads for the 33-year-old, who finished second to Dylan Groenewegen in Valencia two years ago.

Following the Spanish opening weekend, he will contest the first French professional race of the season, the Grand Prix de Marseille-La Marseillaise, before traveling to the Middle East. There, he will tackle the Muscat Classic and the Tour of Oman, a race where he secured second and third place finishes on stages in 2024.

However, the most unusual addition to his 2026 schedule comes before his major spring objectives of Paris-Nice and Milan-San Remo. Coquard will head to Greece to participate in two .1 events: the Visit South Aegean GP and the Rhodes GP.

Moving into the heart of the spring, his preparation for the Ardennes classics, specifically De Brabantse Pijl and the Amstel Gold Race, will take place in France. Coquard plans to mix and match various French Cup one-day races to build form.

"That is the fuzzy part of my program," he admitted, noting that he will choose between events such as La Roue Tourangelle, the Route Adélie de Vitré, Paris-Camembert, and Cholet-Pays de la Loire. There is also a possibility of racing the Pays de la Loire Tour.

His first block of the season will conclude with the 4 Jours de Dunkerque in May, followed by the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and the French National Championships in June. "Then, it's the holidays," he said.

The "holidays" in July do not necessarily have a positive meaning in this case and signify a major shift in Coquard’s career: he will not participate in the Tour de France. It would have been his ninth appearance at the Grande Boucle.

"I was ready to put myself at his service during this season, it was not a problem for me at all," Coquard revealed. "But the team doesn't want me to put myself in a pilot fish role, even if it is not pejorative to be one. You can have a great career in that position."

With the Tour de France off his calendar, Coquard is turning his full attention to the Vuelta a España. He will start it for the fifth consecutive time, but for the first time in years, he will arrive fresh.

"I will be able to do the Vuelta with a preparation, which was not the case in the past because of the Tour just before or Covid," he explained. "I want to prepare for the Vuelta like I used to for the Tour with the idea of finally winning a stage on a Grand Tour. It is clearly the objective of the year."

Regarding the route of the upcoming Vuelta, which is expected to be characteristically hilly, Coquard does not seem too worried. "I'm not going to win in the mountains, but it will tire out the sprinters," he noted. "Hopefully, I will be less tired than them. The Vuelta is a challenge that suits me well."