How are the 2026 Tour de France contenders shaping up?

Thursday 26 March marks exactly 100 days until the 2026 Tour de France, with teams setting off down the start ramp of the team time trial in Barcelona on stage one on the afternoon of Saturday 4 July.

That might seem like a world away now, in cold March, but in just a few months we will be tracking the world’s best cyclists around l’Hexagone.

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Tadej Pogačar has dominated the last two Tours de France, and there is little evidence that this is going to end soon. Last year he only won four stages on his way to overall victory by four minutes, despite suffering from a back injury during the races latter stages.

This season, it has gone pretty well so far: two one-day races, two victories. An expected masterclass at Strade Bianche was followed by an epic sprint win at Milan-San Remo, edging the Slovenian closer to completing the set of Monuments. It does mean, however, that we don’t have any idea of his stage racing form due to his Classics-oriented schedule.

His first stage race won’t come until the end of next month, at the Tour de Romandie, followed by the Tour de Suisse in June, and then the Tour. That said, it’s a similar pattern to the one he followed last season, with only the UAE Tour missing; in 2026 he didn’t race between Liège-Bastogne-Liège and the Critérium du Dauphiné, and he’ll be away from racing for over a month in May-June this year.

It’s hard to see where the cracks in Pogačar’s armour are, although the route this year does not necessarily allow for him to crush all in his customary manner, although I’m sure he will try.

The only other minor thing to think about is Pogačar’s decision to target the Classics too, which brings with it a slightly higher risk of accident and injury, especially with Paris-Roubaix thrown into the mix. The supremely-skilled bike handler will probably be fine, though, and crashes can happen anywhere.

It’s hard to bet against him.

Jonas Vingegaard‘s season couldn’t be more different to Tadej Pogačar’s. There is no one-day racing, instead a total focus on stage races, and the Giro d’Italia is the priority before we even begin to think about the Tour. That’s just 43 days away.

The Dane, the reigning Vuelta a España champion, is looking to complete the set of Grand Tours with a Giro title in May, and will hope to then carry that form into the Tour in July. Pogačar completed the Giro-Tour double in 2024, so could Vingegaard do the same? It will be tricky, although he won the second Grand Tour he took part in last year.

His 2026 was slow to start, but seems to be going to plan now. Vingegaard did not race before Paris-Nice this year, due to illness, but his performance there certainly would have made many take notice.

He won by over four minutes, a crushing performance across eight stages; his biggest rivals might have been absent, but you can only beat what’s in front of you, and Vingegaard did it on an almost unmatched scale, with the largest winning margin since the Second World War. It was a Pogačar-esque performance.

The 29-year-old is currently at the Volta a Catalunya, where a solid performance would continue to build confidence, and hype. As for the Tour, though, the Giro comes first.

Remco Evenepoel, including from myself. The Belgian won seven of his first 11 races this season, including Valenciana overall, and looked to have truly hit the ground running at his new team.

However, a disappointing end to the UAE Tour saw those expectations cooled slightly, and there remains a lot to learn about Evenepoel before the Tour. He is currently riding Catalunya against Vingegaard, and if a serious blow is landed either way, it could change the direction of either rider’s season.

Evenepoel is racing the Ardennes Classics and then the renamed Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes before the Tour, so there is time to build his form for the big goal. He will head to Spain and then France with a solid team, including last year’s third-place, Florian Lipowitz, so will have more backing than he ever did at Soudal Quick-Step. That said, though, it is still a bit of an unknown if he can deliver on the same level as Vingegaard over three weeks and over the high mountains, let alone Pogačar.

Isaac del Toro is this low down the list is because he is Pogačar’s teammate, and therefore not Plan A for UAE. If anything happens to the Slovenian, though, Del Toro might even be thought of as a contender above Vingegaard.

Denied a maiden Grand Tour victory at the Giro d’Italia last year due to Simon Yates and Visma-Lease a Bike brilliance, and some odd tactics, the 22-year-old is clearly a rider who could win a Grand Tour, the question is just when.

So far in 2026, Del Toro has won both the UAE Tour and Tirreno-Adriatico, and he will surely be the favourite at Itzulia Basque Country in just over a week too. He seems to be able to do it all, like his starrier teammate, it just remains to be seen whether he will be allowed to ride his own race or work fully in support of Pogačar. There could easily be a UAE one-two in Paris at the end of July.

Lidl-Trek, winning the Volta ao Algarve in his first race at his new team, before an untimely crash took him out of Paris-Nice while he was in the race lead.

The Spaniard, free of super-domestique duties at UAE Team Emirates, can now show his old team what they’re missing, although he is yet to thread together a complete performance at a Grand Tour. That said, he has finished third and fourth overall at the Vuelta.

His 2026 will get back on track at Itzulia, where he will lock horns with Del Toro, before the La Flèche Wallonne, Liège, and the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. Lidl have been building a solid GC team, and with Ayuso at the point of the spear, are serious contenders.

Paul Seixas, who isn’t definitely going to the Tour yet, but will surely be on the start line in Barcelona. There’s a lot of pressure from France on the teenager’s shoulders, but it doesn’t appear to have affected him too much yet, with impressive performances at Algarve, the Faun-Ardèche Classic and Strade Bianche.

What is unknown, however, is how he will fare in a Grand Tour, considering he’s never raced one before, let alone the behemoth which is the Tour. We’ll know more about his stage racing form at Itzulia, but Decathlon definitely have a star on their hands.

Vuelta a España last year, second at Milan-San Remo, a winner twice this year already, Tom Pidcock is clearly a star of the peloton. The only reason he isn’t higher up these power rankings is because, well, he’s on the record as not going for GC at the Tour, instead aiming for a stage win.

This will be Pinarello Q36.5‘s aim at their debut at the biggest race of them all, but there’s also no reason why Pidcock couldn’t aim at the top 10, if not higher, at the Tour. He proved last summer that he can ride Grand Tours, after years of promise, and this Tour could suit him.

He’s currently riding the Volta a Catalunya, which could be his last stage race before July, although the Tour de Suisse or Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes would not look amiss on his schedule. Will ride the Ardennes Classics, too.

Best of the rest

The Ineos Grenadiers duo of Oscar Onley and Kévin Vaquelin both finished in the top 10 last season, but for different teams. The latter finished in the top five of both the Volta ao Algarve and Paris-Nice so far this year, while Onley finished fourth at Algarve before getting ill at Paris-Nice. Together, they offer a new thrust for the British team, and could dovetail to a solid result. Toppling Pogačar, Vingegaard, and Evenepoel seems like a tall order, though.

Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) was sixth at the Tour last year, and could easily repeat that again in July. He was fourth at the recent Tirreno-Adriatico. Fellow top-10 finisher Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) will surely be aiming for stage wins over GC, but he could defy expectations again.

Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) was third last year, but has moved out of the limelight with the arrival of Evenepoel to his team, but is a fantastic option for his squad, and it would not be a surprise were he to shine brighter than his starrier teammate. Other teammates of riders of the list to watch out for include Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike), Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trej), although one would think these are secondary or tertiary chocies.

Finally, Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain-Victorious) had a disappointing Tirreno, but looked almost equal to Del Toro at the UAE Tour, so is very much a solid bet for top 10 at the Tour.

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