"There are very beautiful stages” – Kevin Vauquelin goes stage hunting again at the Tour de France

Kevin Vauquelin begins the 2025 Tour de France with the hope of repeating his stage-winning success from last year, when he won on stage 2 in Italy. The Arkea – B&B Hotels rider enters the race in standout form, having recently placed second overall at the Tour de Suisse, his only defeat there coming at the hands of Joao Almeida.

But Vauquelin knows that form alone guarantees little in the Tour.

"We're in the Tour de France, all the riders who are at the start are in their best form of the year so there will be a very homogeneous and very tough level. We'll see how the first stages go, that's how we feel and see how it goes. Last year, that's how we saw it and it worked, we'll see if my status has really changed in the breakaways.

“It's the Tour, there are a lot of opportunities for all the riders, there are a lot of very good ones, there are records for each rider as long as my arm so if we have to mark all the riders in the peloton, we're not finished."

While Vauquelin has pointed to specific goals, particularly the fourth stage, he’s approaching the race with open expectations, aware of how unpredictable each day can be.

"There are very beautiful stages where there is a way to shine but it's a bike race, you can't know what can happen the days before, in the morning, during the stage... It's sure that there are objectives but there is a peloton, it's the one that also decides what the breakaways do, what the breakaways don't do. Will Tadej Pogacar want to win Rouen, if we have already started to discover ourselves, or not. It's sure that the 4th stage is a stage that I have ticked off, then we'll see how it goes as the first few days go by."