The Briton is likely to be a contender in a breakaway and punchy stages of the Tour de France, should as expected he be selected by Groupama-FDJ

It’s the obvious and most unoriginal of comparisons to make, but in this case it’s the most appropriate: you wait ages for a London bus and then all of a sudden two come at once. For three-and-a-half years, Lewis Askey has plugged away trying to score his first victory as a professional, almost pulling the feat off just a few months into his neo-pro season with Groupama-FDJ, and so nearly becoming national champion and a winner of big second-tier races, but for all the 22 top-10s he managed, winning remained elusive.

“It was getting to the point where I thought I was going to be a nearly man, someone always coming away with second and never going to win,” the 24-year-old Briton tells Rouleur. “I was hoping that winning would’ve come a lot easier, but it really wasn’t. I always felt like I had the ability to do it, but I never really managed to pull it all together. I genuinely had the stress of potentially never winning a bike race.” And then – forgive the other lazy cliché – the floodgates opened.

This article was published by Rouleur in June 2025. To read the full article click here.