Riley Sheehan after a surprising Paris-Tours victory: "I'm looking forward to the future"

Was there even an option to bet on a Riley Sheehan win. The 23-year-old American was a big unknown on the start list of Paris-Tours, but after Sunday that is no longer the case. Sheehan sprinted to victory, as a rider for the NCL team Denver Disruptors and as a trainee with Israel-Premier Tech.

Many crazy stories have been written in cycling and Riley Sheehan's is certainly one of them. He had already ridden for Rally Cycling as a trainee for a few months and Israel-Premier Tech's training programme, Premier Tech U23, as it was called back in 2022. He was apparently not good enough there, because this year he mainly rode in United States for the Denver Disruptors.

"This is more special than anything. This could be a big start for me, with such a win in a special race. It's phenomenal, I'm speechless," Sheehan said.

"We wanted to stay at the front as a team, also because there was no wind. Staying calm all the way to the unpaved roads and climbs and keeping our sprinters in position was our job. I had to monitor any attacks and that worked out well for me," he laughs with a sense of understatement. The fact that he emerged on the unpaved roads of Paris-Tours was not the biggest surprise for him. "Cross has been my thing since I was young and in Colorado we have many beautiful unpaved roads. When I saw the course, I was really looking forward to it."

Ultimately he ended up in a group of five, but we didn't give a penny for his chances there either. However, he did everything perfectly. "It was a super tough sprint. With two kilometers to go I knew we would make it and so I gave up some places, which put me in perfect position. When the first man started, I knew it was the perfect wheel to follow and after that I haven't looked back," said Sheehan, who is logically very curious about what will happen next with his career. "I'm looking forward to the future."