Kévin Geniets has won the Grand Prix La Marseillaise. The Groupama-FDJ rider was the fastest in a two-up sprint at the end of the first French race of the year, and took his first pro win outside of national championships.
The French race began with a breakaway of five riders consisting of Théo Delacroix, Alex Colman, Hugo Toumire, Jean-Louis Le Ny and Jelle Vermoote. Not a threatening group, which the peloton comfortably managed to keep on a tight leash, before the day's action would kick off in the final kilometers of the day.
Pre-race favourites Milan Menten and Stefano Oldani were among a big crash that took place with 40 kilometers to go. The peloton, still sizeable however, was no longer after it tackled the Route des Crêtes. Rémy Rochas put in a strong effort to launch Groupama-FDJ teammate Kévin Geniets and Alex Baudin in the toughest climb of the day.
The two went clear from the peloton, but behind the race was blown to bits just as much. There was no longer a peloton to chase but instead small groups which did not find perfect collaboration, which led the gap to grow up to 50 seconds.
In the final ascent of the day Kévin Vauquelin attacked from the chasing group and arrived at the summit with 25 seconds disadvantage; whilst other chasers were not too far. Fatigue settled in the leading duo but the downhill finish favoured them.
Geniets led out the sprint from the front, however he had too much speed for Baudin in the finishing straight and rode into a fabulous win in the center of Marseille. Kévin Vauquelin rode to a third spot closely behind.
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- He should have been allowed to go to Movistar. Right now both arent a good fit for each other and are just wasting each other's time and effortabstractengineer08-11-2026
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Rafionain-Glas08-11-2026 - i did not see it. was the relegation justified or an overly hard decision? and don‘t cross riders deviate from straight lines all the time? bumping into each others when they cut corners, etc … why being more strict with the rules on the finish sprint?Ketterechts08-11-2026
- seems like we are advertising the website with pointless comments…Ketterechts08-11-2026
- So?Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- The UCI do have their favorites.
Front24208-11-2026 - On a positive note, you maybe notice turning this topic into a discussion has the benefit of eliminating certain participants who do not see how they can turn it back to their sole interest ;-)Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
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- That may be but that was unknown to others and nothing says that’s the whole truth. Again, don’t try to misinterpret, it is a call and technically it is correct. Besides, even if there is a valid reason, that does not disqualify the ruling or punishment as far as the rules have been developed. I don’t think they’re as far as in football where for handball there is a distinction (in some ways and specific cases) between intentional or not. And football can be just as harsh and people live with it, eg the offside rule, also judged to within tiny fractions but often wrong or ignored. It’s the nature of every collective organisation and sometimes I wonder if our rebellion against it isn’t seated in the feelings we carry from the injustices we’ve felt personally, like being flashed driving 1km/h too fast when we are explained limits are just a security measure but we are absolutely certain not to have endangered anyone with our transgression. The problem is, nobody has better solutions and no 2 people have the same interpretation of where a limit should be.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
- Because for you deviated implies the other rider MUST have been made to fall and fail to finish ??? I don’t know if you ride a bike but next time someone carves you up or drives dangerously close, just hold back from those feelings of changing something, reporting or filming or even complaining. Everyone will just say, hey you’re still here undamaged, doesn’t seem like anyone did anything.Jumpyjohn08-11-2026
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