Lidl-Trek’s Amanuel Ghebreigzabhier leads the Vuelta peloton. Image: Unipublic/Antonio Baixauli/Cxcling Creative Agency
The Kigali Worlds are just around the corner. I’ve got lots planned for Global Peloton over the next couple of weeks. You can get 10% off a paid subscription until the start of the Worlds.
For now, I’ve removed the paywall on this piece as it’s an important topic.
Next year, there could be as few as six African riders across the men’s and women’s WorldTours. Despite the boom of success in recent years through the likes of Biniam Girmay and Kim Le Court-Pienaar, numbers are dwindling.
There have been just three new African additions to the WorldTour in the 2024 and 2025 seasons: Le Court-Pienaar, Alan Hatherly and Henok Mulubrhan. At the same time, more have left and Mulubrhan, Louis Meintjes and Hagos Welay are without confirmed 2026 contracts, while Ryan Gibbons has already announced his retirement at the end of this year.
Robbie Hunter is one of Africa’s most successful cyclists of all time. After retirement in 2013, the South African became an agent and has represented several high profile African riders in the last decade, including the likes of Meintjes and Merhawi Kudus.
In negotiating with teams as an African rider’s representative, Hunter says that they often come with “complications,” with visas, travel and language sometimes all inhibiting factors. In addition, he says African riders can at times struggle to merge socially with the team.
All of this means that it can be harder for African riders to secure contracts or to maintain longer careers in the sport, even if they have more than enough talent to do so.
In a phone conversation from the headquarters of Hunter’s agency, ProTouch Global, he brings up Ethiopian rider Hagos Welay, who Hunter has worked with since he turned professional. Welay is in his final year of three at WorldTour level with Jayco-AlUla, but looks set to be released by the Australian team at the end of the season, and Hunter is having little luck finding him a new team.
“I’ve got a kid right now who pushes, you know, 6.8 watts per kilo, and people are thinking, ‘hmm, we’re not sure he’s got the talent’, Hunter tells Global Peloton.
“He absolutely has the talent to turn professional and stay professional within the WorldTour. He’s done his third year now. He’s gotten a sparkle of a result here and there. Let’s say the Tour of Austria, where he finishes basically on the podium or just off the podium. But then the minute it goes to the bigger races, where all the big boys end up on the same start line, and then it’s almost a go from start to finish [without picking up a result].”
“That is absolutely not what teams are expecting. Teams want to see riders perform. They want to see them go harder, go deeper, go further.”
Hunter’s issue with the Welay situation is that he has seen so many European riders be given more opportunity to prove themselves in a similar situation. He doesn’t believe the 23-year-old has been given a fair shot and that is the case time and again with African riders.
“It’s not easy representing an athlete that kind of shows a sparkle and then after two years teams just go off. ‘We were hoping it was a bit better, so thanks for coming’. And yet the very same athlete, if he was a European, gets given four or five years to develop or whatever the case may be.”
“The other ones kind of get passed along, in and out the system quicker than they should. It’s not fun to see.”
Hunter brings up another African rider who he has worked with, possibly the African male rider seen on the TV screens more than any other due to his role towing the peloton for kilometre after kilometre.
Eritrean Amanuel Ghebreigzabhier almost dropped out of the sport two years ago after Lidl-Trek informed Hunter that they didn’t want to renew his contract as the rider hadn’t been a good fit for the squad, according to them, due to his quiet demeanour. He had struggled to fit into the team socially. Lidl-Trek eventually announced his renewal thatJanuary.
“The team spoke to me about it and they didn’t want to sign him. They ended up signing super, super late in the season because they said he just wasn’t fitting in. Yes, he’s super strong. Yes, he gets the job done. But we need to make a team. And a person who sits in a corner is not part of a team,” Hunter recalls.
This social aspect can be among the hardest things for riders who are not only trying to make their way in a sporting sense, but are entering a completely new culture, a new way of living.
Hunter says that more outgoing characters such has Natnael Tesfatsion and Henok Mulubrhan have found life easier.
“It’s a massive problem. Because if you’re going to come to Europe, everybody’s got this dream. And it doesn’t matter where you’re from; Australia, UK, England, America, South Africa or Eritrea. If you’re not going to come and live in Europe and try and adapt to the European lifestyle, then you’re going to sit in a corner and only do things your way. You’re not going to progress, ever.”
Since then, Ghebreigzabhier has become one of the very best domestiques in the sport, spending hour upon hour on the front in the service of the likes of Mads Pedersen, Jonathan Milan and Giulio Ciccone.
The UCI wants to see the sport become more global. If that is to happen, then riders from outside of Europe need to get a fair shot.
Teams need a change of perspective towards these riders. If they do, they might just find themselves a hidden gem.
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