“In the right situation, I can win a Grand Tour” - Tom Pidcock backs himself against Pogacar, Vingegaard and Seixas as Tour de France challenge looms

Tom Pidcock is heading towards the Tour de France with no interest in pretending the race hierarchy has suddenly been turned upside down. Tadej Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard and Paul Seixas remain the names around which July is expected to revolve, but Pidcock is not shutting himself out of the conversation either.

The 26-year-old arrives as one of cycling’s most difficult riders to place. He is a double Olympic mountain bike champion, a cyclocross world champion, a Tour de France stage winner on Alpe d’Huez, a Classics contender and a 2025 Vuelta a Espana podium finisher. At the Pinarello Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team, he is also the central figure of a team heading into its first Tour de France with far more than stage-hunting ambition.

Speaking in an interview with The Guardian, Pidcock was clear about both the scale of the challenge and the level he still believes he can reach.

“Everything I’ve ever achieved in my career, I’ve always imagined doing it first before I’ve done it. I’ve never done anything out of the blue, like magic. So having that stepping stone, I know I can be on the podium again,” he said. “I’m not saying that I have the ability right now to beat Tadej and Seixas and Vingegaard. But in the right situation, I can see it happening. And with the right situation, I can win a Grand Tour.”

Pidcock’s Vuelta podium last year shifted the discussion around him. He had already won on the biggest road stages, most memorably on Alpe d’Huez at the 2022 Tour, but a Grand Tour podium put a different frame around his three-week potential.

His own relationship with Grand Tours remains typically blunt. “The Grand Tour thing doesn’t really excite me so much, but it’s an achievement,” he admitted. “If I manage to win a Grand Tour it will be the biggest achievement in my career, because for me to concentrate for three weeks is difficult."

“But I want to win the road worlds. Then I will have won all three disciplines. And the gravel worlds, actually, but if that never happens I’m not so bothered," he adds. "I want a Monument. And for sure, I’m going for three Olympic medals. My goal is to finish my career after five Olympics, so after the 2036 Olympic Games I’ll retire.”

That wider ambition has always separated Pidcock from more conventional road leaders. The Tour de France sits inside a much broader career plan, alongside world titles, Monuments and Olympic targets that stretch another decade into the future.

Pidcock has already tested himself directly against Pogacar this season. At Milan-San Remo, the Slovenian crashed inside the final 30 kilometres, attacked on the Poggio, dropped almost everyone and then beat Pidcock by just four centimetres on the Via Roma.

“Up the Poggio, when I was following his attack, it was like racing a zombie,” Pidcock recalled. “He was white, white skinsuit, white shorts cut up, blood. He’s a demon. It was incredible.”

The defeat left Pidcock frustrated, but the performance stayed with him. “He crashed, and he still dropped everyone in the race apart from me,” he said. “And we came to the line sprinting for the win. Obviously I was very frustrated with how close it was. Honestly, I have so much respect for him after that. He could have easily thrown in a towel. He got up. And he still won the race. That was a really incredible thing.”

Pidcock was also asked whether Pogacar’s dominance risks making cycling boring. “Well, you have to embrace and accept it,” he replied. “But they’re not wrong, are they?”

Pidcock’s road career has taken on a different shape since his move away from INEOS Grenadiers at the end of 2024. He joined Pinarello-Q36.5 as the team’s marquee name and has since become the face of a project trying to force its way into the top tier. “I’m a lot happier,” he said. “It’s no secret that it was not going well at INEOS. It’s brilliant and I also think you see that in my results. But we left on good terms.”

Asked whether beating former INEOS teammate Egan Bernal at the Tour of the Alps gave him extra pleasure, Pidcock offered only: “No comment.”

That Tour of the Alps stage win came after a brutal crash at the Volta a Catalunya in March, where Pidcock fell into a ravine, suffered a tibia stress fracture, damaged knee ligaments and sustained heavy bruising. He still climbed back out and finished the stage.

“So it’s funny … well, it wasn’t funny,” he said. “But at the time, once I’d got out of the ditch, I could get on the bike and I could kind of pedal. My shoulder, my elbow and my hand initially hurt the most. I was like, ‘Yeah, I’ve definitely broken something here but maybe I haven’t. I’m going to finish the stage.’”

By the time he reached hospital, his knee had swollen badly and he could not walk. Less than a month later, he was back racing. “I had quite a long time off - basically nine days doing completely nothing - which I never do even in an off season,” he said. “But I actually felt all right on the bike. I was like: ‘OK, let’s go race. Why not?’ And to be honest that’s quite brave, because I’m in the spotlight. I’m showing myself up a little bit if I’m not good. People expect me to perform.”

Pidcock now heads towards July with a Tour stage win, a Vuelta podium and one of the most varied palmares in the sport already behind him. Pogacar, Vingegaard and Seixas may start above him in the pecking order, but Pidcock has already pictured the scenario in which the race becomes something more.