What Next for Pidcock? ‘Confidence I Could Win a Grand Tour’

Pidcock’s coach cracked the GC code to deliver a breakout Vuelta podium finish for the multi-discipine star. But now the Brit might face some tough choices.

(Photo: Tim de Waele/Getty Images)

Updated September 15, 2025 07:03AM

Was a grand tour star born in Tom Pidcock at this Vuelta a España?

A breakout podium finish Sunday at the Vuelta could push Pidcock’s wildly diverse three-discipline palmarès a whole new trajectory.

“We came here for top-10, top-5 was optimistic, and here I am now on the podium,” Pidcock said Saturday.

“The work we’ve done, this team, the shape they’ve got me in, it gives me more confidence than ever that one day I could win a grand tour,” Pidcock said after he gutted it out with the pure climbers on the Bola del Mundo.

“But for now, I’ll enjoy this.”

Pidcock stitched together three of his best weeks of road racing across this wildly dramatic edition of La Vuelta.

Power bests and a newfound patience suggested that, after years of hype, maybe Pidcock could be a grand tour player after all.

“I really don’t know what to say now, except that I’m pretty proud of myself,” Pidcock said Saturday. “I think it’s definitely the biggest performance of my career.”

The final La Vuelta 2025 podium 🏆

Jonas Vingegaard adds a third Grand Tour title to his palmares by winning the Vuelta a España, while Tom Pidcock secures the first Grand Tour podium of his career and João Almeida his second.

📸 Sprint Cycling
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🇪🇸 #LaVuelta25 pic.twitter.com/wrTyPG2xpE

— Velon CC (@VelonCC) September 14, 2025

The cycling world seems to be Pidcock’s oyster right now.

Finishing third behind Jonas Vingegaard and João Almeida after a day of mayhem Sunday in Madrid might make Pidcock the most “complete” male rider in modern cycling.

A grand tour podium, Olympic cross-country MTB and cyclocross world titles, and wins at Strade Bianche and Amstel Gold?

It’s a collection that would do Pidcock’s former Ineos teammate Pauline Ferrand-Prévot proud.

Cracking the GC code
Pidcock hung tough with the pure climbers on the steeps of Bola del Mundo on stage 20. (Photo: Harry Talbot / Gruber / Velo)

In the longer term, Pidcock’s all-terrain capacity could cause complications.

Pidcock has long been stalked by suggestions he’s trying too much.

For now at least, it seems the legacy-hunting Brit has become transfixed by the challenge of general classification. And that’s just as well – his new Q36.5 Pro Cycling team has WorldTour and Tour de France dreams, after all.

How far could Pidcock go across three weeks?

His long-time coach Kurt Bogaerts suggested to The Cycling Podcast the sky could be the limit.

“We are three minutes from the winner. And now we know that if we will potentially win a grand tour one of these days, we need to close a minimum of three to four minutes,” Bogaerts said this weekend. “I think that’s an achievable gap.

“This is only the Vuelta, but it’s a step in the right direction for Tom with the numbers he was doing. I think his body got a signal that it can recover during stages,” the Belgian told The Cycling Podcast.

Applying hard lessons from the Giro onto the Vuelta

Nobody rated Pidcock for the podium ahead of this Vuelta.

A career-best 13th overall at the Tour de France in 2023 and an uncharacteristically anonymous ride this May at the Giro d’Italia didn’t promise much.

Bogaerts revealed to The Cycling Podcast how Pidcock’s newfound capacity on long climbs and three-week durability came from tough lessons learned at the Giro.

He went into the corsa rosa cooked from the classics and came out of it burned in 16th overall.

Unlike every other grand tour in his career, Pidcock started the Vuelta a España last month free of fatigue from previous racing or the distraction of future goals.

The 26-year-old saw only five days of road racing between his 2025 grand tours.

“I had more time for thorough preparation this time, with an altitude camp and the Arctic Race of Norway,” Pidcock said last month before the Vuelta’s gran salida.

“I’m curious to see what I can do in the general classification.”

Stepping up to the Tour de France
Pidcock and Q36.5 Pro Cycling have long-term Tour de France goals. (Photo: Dario Belingheri/Getty Images)

Bogaerts might have cracked the GC code for Pidcock.

The fast-twitch MTB champion hung with Vingegaard, Almeida, and Sepp Kuss on the Vuelta’s hardest climbs and delivered “the best time trial of his life.”

Despite all that, he still could have won stage 11’s neutralized mini-classic around Bilbao.

But Pidcock and Bogaerts are realistic.

The Vuelta a España is not the Tour de France.

Bogaerts indicated Le Tour is his rising team’s big goal, but accepted that Pidcock won’t be bothering Pogi, Remco, and a fully healthy Jonas any time soon.

“I don’t think we need to go next year to try to win it, or only to go for the podium,” Bogaerts said of the Tour.

“I think we try to copy this and analyze this event in detail. What can we do better? And what do we do well already?

“Let’s make it achievable, the progression,” he said. “And you also need to know that the opposition will progress.”

Q36.5 Pro Cycling all in on ‘Project Pidcock’
Pidcock brought Q36.5 MTB World Cup victory in July at Pas Arinsal. (Photo: Red Bull Content Pool)

Q36.5 Pro Cycling has all the potential to see that progression with Pidcock.

Bogaert and his athelete learned what works.

And Q36.5’s billionaire owner Ivan Glasenberg is all-in on reaping the rewards from his team’s new talisman.

The arrival of Eddie Dunbar, Chris Hamilton, and Xandro Meurisse in 2026 will bring the Brit a new mountain train. The signing of Fred Wright and Quinten Hermans means he’ll see strong support in the spring.

Pinarello is expected to join Q36.5 Pro Cycling as bike sponsor too, not that Pidcock has been held back by racing road on a Scott.

But while Pidcock will see all the support he could wish for in 2026, he can’t have it all.

There will have to be compromise between cyclocross, MTB, and the road.

He’s not yet revealed his short-term cyclocross intentions, but if last year is anything to go by, Pidcock won’t see too much mud this winter. The 26-year-old might be getting tanned at thin air instead.

Ambitions in the Ardennes also might need a rethink if Q36.5 – a team still reliant on wildcard invites – gets the call for the Giro or Tour.

‘If he puts his mind towards something, he doesn’t fail much’
Pidcock was the one rider who could hang with Pogačar at Strade Bianche – could he convert that to the Tour de France? (Photo: Gruber Images / Velo)

Grand tour racing will likely be center of Pidcock’s universe for the next two years while he’s with Q36.5 Pro Cycling.

Bogaerts hinted that his athlete’s increased maturity and sheer bloody-mindedness make a podium repeat a possibility.

“If he puts his mind towards something, he doesn’t fail much,” he told The Cycling Podcast.

“GC Pidcock” hype has been gathering speed ever since he burst onto the road scene at the 2020 “Baby Giro.”

Five years later, he delivered at the Vuelta a España.

His biggest problem now might be figuring out how CX, MTB, and the classics fit in to any grand tour identity.