The Tour de l'Avenir, or the Tour of the Future, is a good place to look when trying to spot the next big names on the professional circuit. The race's illustrious list of former winners includes Vuelta a Espana leader Nairo Quintana and former Tour de France winners Miguel Indurain and Greg LeMond. The 2016 Tour de l'Avenir was fought out over eight days of tough racing, with Frenchman David Gaudu becoming the latest victor.
Cyclingnews takes a look at Gaudu and the seven others that added a stage win at the Tour de l'Avenir to their palmares.
Name: Vincenzo Albanese
Age: 19
Nationality: Italian
Team for 2017: Bardiani-CSF
Type of rider: Sprinter
What is special: The last Italian yellow jersey at the Tour de l'Avenir was a certain Filippo Pozzato in 2002. Vincenzo Albanese broke the ice on the first stage of the 2016 edition when he outsprinted his breakaway companions, all top class riders in their category, Norway's Amund Jansen (see below), Belgium's Nathan Van Hooydonck, the Classics rider polished by BMC Development team, and Tao Geoghegan Hart, Team Sky's neo-professional in 2017. Albanese was the fastest of them when he launched his sprint with 200m to the finish line. "I am very happy to win, it was not a difficult sprint for me," he said afterwards. The day after he lost his yellow jersey as his national team didn't want to control the peloton and lose energy, aware that Albanese, a poor climber, was going to lose his “maglia” sooner or later. He looked very disappointed at the end of stage 2 though and then fought for the points jersey – he won it with an advantage of zero point to Jansen, but his ranking at the stages made the difference, as he was more consistent than the Norwegian. A newcomer to Bardiani-CSF in 2017, Albanese could be on the podium of the U23 World Championships next October.
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Name: Amund Grøndahl Jansen
Age: 22
Nationality: Norwegian
Team for 2017: TBC
Type of rider: Rouleur/Classics
What is special: Amund Jansen could have easily been awarded "le super combatif" rider at the 2016 Tour de l'Avenir. The Norwegian was so disappointed to have lost the sprint after his breakaway on stage 1 that he tried again the day after, went solo first and then with two other riders which he beat at the end – out-sprinting Britain's Jon Dibben, the point's race World Champion, means you have a real burst of sprint. This success allowed him to wear the yellow jersey for two days. "But this victory is not my biggest performance at the race," Jansen says. The Norwegian riders kept fighting indeed at the following stages, despite him suffering stomach problems and with the relatively heavy weight of rouleur – you struggle more in the Alps when you are 81 kilos like Jansen compared to 54 kilos like French David Gaudu. On stage 6, Jansen was dropped in the first climb, lost one minute to the gruppetto but fought in the downhill to come back and avoid time elimination. His ride the day after was even more impressive as he blew up right from the start on the Col de l'Iseran (he had only eaten five yogurts before this demanding stage). Jansen's suffering during the last three hilly stages was a lesson in fighting that team managers will perhaps reward by offering him a pro contract in 2017.
Name: Kristoffer Halvorsen
Name: Adrien Costa
Name: John Rodriguez
Name: David Gaudu
Name: Nick Schultz
Name: Neilson Powless
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