Americans in the pro peloton
 

This is a thread for updates and discussion about American pro riders

Brandon McNulty gets a fair amount of attention here, being the subject of his own long-standing thread. His strong performance at the TdF this year showed that he's beginning to live up to his promise. But of course, he's not the only yank racing in Europe.

Sepp Kuss is likely the best American rider at present. His work on behalf of Roglic in 2020 and his stage win in 2021* were both impressive. It was the first stage win by an American at the TdF in 10 years! What a long drought that was.

Quinn Simmons is going to be a monster, though he may have to learn to keep his mouth shut. His performance at age 18 at Leadville is legendary, and he just won his first pro race - at 20
https://www.cyclingnews.com/races/to...age-3/results/

And then there's Neilson Powless.



Who else?

I remember not too long ago, there were more riders in the TdF peloton from Luxembourg than from the US. But things are looking up for the US pros.

Glancing at PCS, there are 415 American riders listed. Men and women. This view gives you all of them. Unfortunately, it doesn't have a handy filter for World Tour, Pro Continental, etc.

Scanning the first 100, I saw Lawson Craddock who belong in the the list I think you're starting.

Sean Bennett finished the 2021 TdF 130th in GC, 57th in Points, and 27th in Under 23.

Lawson Craddock was an obvious omission on my part, but I didn't know that Sean Bennett was American. So good catches, both.

And yeah, there are lots of Americans on the continental tours, probably on both sides of the pond, but I meant men on the World Tour.

There are some strong American women now racing too, though it seems mostly not on the road.

You can filter the official UCI rankings by nationality. Some notable other Americans are Matteo Jorgensen, Larry Warbasse, Chad Haga, and Will Barta. The first 2 have been mixing it up in breakaways in GT stages, the latter 2 have been close to winning ITTs (edit: Haga did get the win at the Giro 2 years ago).

Brent Bookwalter is on Team Bike Exchange thru the end of 2021. He will retire at the end of this season and wasn't scheduled to do any of the Grand Tours in 2021.

Let's not forget our 2019 National road champ, Alex Howes who's been riding for EF for a few years.

Don't worry, I always have to think which Bennett it is, George,Sam, or Sean. :lol:

He's been more noticeable in the alternative events than UCI races since then. Not a bad thing, just might explain the lack of visibility in the World Tour if his goals/focus has shifted away from traditional pro cycling.

Yup. He and Lachlan seem to be the "hipsters" of the team. lol

Alex seemed busy in the spring finishing tirreno-adriatico, tour de suisse, classics of Amstel, Fleche, L-B-L. DNF'ed itzulia, strade. He was there on domestique duty so really low key, but he wore the US flag on his jersey so really stood out. Great Jersey!

Brandon McNulty just placed 6th in the men's Olympic road race and briefly looked like he'd be first or second. Quinn Simmons just won over all at Tour of Wallonie.

Yeah, McNullty put on a great performance on a course that I wouldn't have thought was to his advantage. More good things, to come, it seems.

Yeah, Carapaz ultimately used McNulty's effort to grab the gold, but it was a hero performance by him on a really difficult course. He had a great tour with his team leader winning and now 6th at the Olympics. The future is bright!

:thumb: He just got a big result today!

Oh cool! And he beat Mohoric at the line- great work!

Add Magnus Sheffield - 19 years old and just signed with Ineos.
Another one developed by Rally.

Huge result for Neilson Powless! He looked incredible today!

In his podcast about the Tour this past summer, Lance mentioned that none of the American teams have any American riders. I wonder why they don't?

EF does. They have quite a few on the team.

And one of them finished 5th in the World.

There are only two American teams on the World tour - EF and Trek Segafredo. EF has half a dozen american riders and Trek-Segafredo has Quinn Simmons.

So Lance is 100% wrong.

Maybe Lance meant that those teams didn't have any Americans in the Tour, but Neilson Powless started and finished the TdF, so he's still wrong.

Yes, he must have meant in the Tour but there is more to bike racing than "just" Le Tour de France.

Trek also has Kiel Reijnen.

https://www.procyclingstats.com/rider/kiel-reijnen

https://www.procyclingstats.com/team...segafredo-2021

I have been under the impression that UCI requires at least two riders on the team roster be from the country the team claims to be. Don't know if that's true, but it's been the subject of controversy ever once in a while through the years. Some wanting more home country riders to be required and other saying none is enough.

I don't know if there is any requirement that they be in the make up of any team actually doing a one-day, tour or grand tour.