News editor at Cycling Weekly, Adam brings his weekly opinion on the goings on at the upper echelons of our sport.
This piece is part of The Leadout, the offering of newsletters from Cycling Weekly and Cyclingnews. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here. As ever, email adam.becket@futurenet.com – should you wish to add anything, or suggest a topic.
Ineos Grenadiers championed the 500th victory of their existence over the weekend, with Pauline Ferrand-Prévot claiming the win at a French Cup mountain bike race.
It’s interesting that the milestone went to the one woman on the team, who sits alongside 29 male cyclists. Ineos Grenadiers are one of the richest, most successful teams in professional cycling history, and yet their lack of a women’s road team is stark.
Visma-Lease a Bike, UAE Team Emirates, and even Soudal Quick-Step now have a Women’s WorldTour equivalent, but Ineos do not. They are not alone in being both one of the biggest squads and male only – Bora-Hansgrohe are of almost a similar stature, and are male only. Ineos, however, have been around for longer, and are British, hence our particular interest.
It’s 2024, and not having equivalent men’s and women’s teams stands out.
When Ferrand-Prévot – who has been world champion on the road, in cyclocross, and mountain bike disciplines – landed at Ineos in 2022, it was hoped that it would herald a new era at Ineos, one in which the squad could build a women’s equivalent of their men’s WorldTour roster. However, this expectation hasn’t materialised, with the Frenchwoman just being a bit of a lone bolt-on to their men’s road outfit, riding mountain bike races in Ineos kit on a Pinarello.
Ferrand-Prévot is out of contract at the end of this year, so it may well be crunch time for any hope of her being joined by more female riders. She has made noises about wanting to get back into road cycling after the Paris Olympics, so this could be the perfect opportunity to build a team around her.
“I come from road racing originally, so of course I’d like to return to the road one day,” the Frenchwoman told Cycling Weekly last year, but said “I don’t know” when asked if that would happen riding for Ineos.
If the former world champion is simply allowed to leave for another women’s squad, then it seems like an opportunity squandered. It would be an odd couple of years in Ferrand-Prévot’s career, where she was the only woman on a men’s team, and the sport would move on. But it would still be a mark against Ineos that they barely tried to create a women’s equivalent.
It isn’t like Ineos lack the financial resources necessary to create that team, as proven by Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s partial takeover of Manchester United, but perhaps they lack the drive and the interest. Crucially, they are also running out of time. It’s probably still possible to create a women’s team for 2025, a year in which women’s ProTeams will exist for the first time, adding a potential good level for a new Ineos women’s team to ride at, but each week that passes will make it harder.
Some will even question the need for Ineos to have a women’s team, and perhaps they don’t care. But women’s cycling is the segment that’s in constant growth, offering access to new audiences – so, careful business minds should care.
Ferrand-Prévot is a multi-discipline star, just like Tom Pidcock or Mathieu van der Poel, and needs a team around her in order to race on the road again. It’s just not clear whether Ineos Grenadiers want to rack up many more victories by women.
This piece is part of The Leadout, the offering of newsletters from Cycling Weekly and Cyclingnews. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here.
If you want to get in touch with Adam, email adam.becket@futurenet.com.