Too much money in too few teams - Romain Bardet very worried about "the path that cycling is also heading towards"

Romain Bardet has talked extensively about some of the biggest topics of his career this week, including concerns over performance enhancing methods, the dominance of Tadej Pogacar; but also the worry over the financial differences that grow in the peloton and if it's worth it to have a team built around you the Tour de France.

Questioned on whether it felt like the right time to retire, the veteran continues to believe it is, knowing he is still able to perform and win at the highest level but that there won't be progression, whilst the peloton climbs faster and faster every year that goes by. "It's not the sacrifices or maybe yes, this life from hotel to hotel, from airport to airport... It's mainly my physical limits that have been, I think, reached. I can still get results but I won't win many races every year," Bardet said in an interview with Eurosport France.

In the past France's greatest hope to win the Tour de France, Bardet snatched two podium places at the Grand Boucle whilst leading a French team, AG2R who at the time was no match for Chris Froome's Team Sky. Two riders that could not be further away from each other led to great battles in 2016 and 2017, but the Frenchman sees current racing as something very different.

A few teams such as UAE Team Emirates and Team Visma | Lease a Bike have incredibly strong teams that most others simply cannot match even with their A-team. Bardet is a good example of that currently, being part of a Team DSM-Firmenich that is struggling to match most World Tour teams in most terrains. Bardet - who will retire at the 2025 Criterium du Dauphiné - provided the most points in a team that is trying to develop a few young riders to become it's new leaders; Fabio Jakobsen has proven to be a signing that reaped very little benefit whilst the team has only officially announced two signings for next season: two development team riders.

"... When you are the leader of a team, you have six guys working for you and you pay them at the end with a 6th or 7th place, you ask yourself questions. Are you up to par? This is the path that cycling is also heading towards, aggregating talent and the biggest payrolls within a handful of entities. We are heading towards a cycling where competitive interest is greatly reduced," he says. This already is visible, as most Grand Tour teams, with one or two exceptions per GT, split ambitions between different fields.

Even at the Tour de France, six teams filled the entire Top6. Less and less teams will want to devote entire teams to protecting a GC leader when the leader himself is frequently dropped by the second or third riders in line of a team like UAE Team Emirates, which means that the leaders rarely even get to benefit from their support. This was specially visible with Soudal - Quick-Step, who signed Mikel Landa to support Remco Evenepoel at the Tour and had a spotless race riding himself to fifth, but the Belgian never truly needed the Basque's support as UAE and Visma were in a battle amongst themselves in every single mountain stage whilst all others just focused on surviving in the wheels for as long as possible.

But from time to time the Tour gives some of it's magic and Bardet highlighted that on the opening day this year, attacking on a hilly day in the Italian hills racing by instinct, linking up with teammate Frank van den Broek, and by the end the duo just held off the peloton to take a masterful win that also landed Bardet the yellow jersey for the first time in his career.

"It's clear, it's incredible. I come across van den Broek. He tells me: 'I'm dead, I'll set the pace for you for 3 kilometers, I'll move away and you'll finish all alone. I answer him: No, absolutely not! I got in front in the climbs at a pace he could keep up. I absolutely wanted to keep him because I didn't have much doubt about the peloton. I love Valentin [Madouas] who was with us but I wanted us to stay with two teammates. They came back close but I was really thinking about winning when I left," he details. "It's incredible what he (van den Broek, ed.) did, he's a steer, he dragged me in the final. Everything that comes together is a bit of what's still magical in the uncertainty of sport".