revealed by stickybottle recently<\/a>, team boss Jonathan Vaughters has said the Irishman is now on the cusp of big things.<\/p>\n\u201cWhen we brought him onto the team, Archie had some chronic injuries that held him back from turning pro elsewhere,\u201d Vaughters said of the knee issues that cost the young Wicklow rider almost all of his U23 career, when riding for the Jumbo-Visma Development Team.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut once he joined the team, he very quickly repaid our faith in him by demonstrating that he could race at the highest level,\u201d Vaughters added of Ryan hitting his stride over the past two years, with two wins in 2024 and a series of very strong results, in harder races, this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cExtending his contract gives him more time to prove that he can win races in the WorldTour. He has very specific abilities as a rider, and one of these days, in one of these races that has a really explosive uphill finish, he\u2019s going to pull something special off. We all believe in him.\u201d<\/p>\n
For his part, Ryan said EF Education-EasyPost \u201cbelieved in me right from the very start\u201d. It is a team that helped him overcome his injuries even before he went onto their roster for the start of the 2024 season. <\/p>\n
Late the previous year he was only able to start his season in mid August, getting just one race in before Tour de l\u2019Avenir. But despite that, he took a mountain stage victory with his now trademark aggressive climbing displays. <\/p>\n
In the weeks that followed he won Coppa Citta\u2019 Di San Daniele (1.2) and was 2nd in U23 Il Lombardia, denied by a questionable movement in the sprint by winner Junior Lecerf (Soudal Quick-Step).<\/p>\n
And having settled in to EF Education-EasyPost over the past two seasons and, crucially, having overcome his knee problems, he sounds delighted to have secured another two-year contract with the team, which will bring him up to the end of 2027.<\/p>\n
He has fellow Irish riders Ben Healy and Darren Rafferty on the team \u2013 both of whom are signed up for at least one more year. And the relationships he has built in the team were cited by Ryan as a key reason for wanting to remain with EF.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I came to the team, I\u2019d had a long period of injury, and the team gave me the opportunity to turn things around and grow. Ever since then, I\u2019ve felt right at home,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is a team where I can develop, but the main reason I decided to re-sign with the team is the people. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels like we have a really special group at EF Education-EasyPost, from the staff, all the way through to the riders. I want to stay here for at least a few more years. I think that it\u2019s a happy accident that some of my best friends before I joined the team are here. It works really well. <\/p>\n
\u201cIn my first year with the team, it felt like I had one of my best mates with me at every race I went to, and as I got to know everyone else, that feeling hasn\u2019t changed. They\u2019re a great group of people, and when I look at other teams, I just know that I fit with this team the best,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cDevelopment for me is about becoming more consistent and adapting to the WorldTour. I\u2019ve not quite got into the swing of that yet, but I want to win bike races and get my hands in the air as much as possible. <\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s why I ride a bike, so I want to build on my results in one-day races and stage races. This is the team that can help me do that,\u201d he said, adding Healy\u2019s rate of development to the very top in pro cycling in the past few years was a \u201chuge inspiration\u201d for everyone on the team.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a friend, it\u2019s special to see a rider like him develop over the last few years. It\u2019s no surprise, for the people who know him, but he\u2019s shown a pathway that inspires us to follow. That\u2019s certainly the dream. It\u2019s not an easy task or a certainty, but we want to try and follow in his footsteps.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Archie Ryan on the front of the breakaway on stage 9 at La Vuelta, one of three longrange…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":342481,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-342480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342480\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/342481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/xRyan-Archie-by-Antonio-Baixauli-10-1200x766.jpg.pagespeed.ic.IqbizGBfZ3.jpg\")
Archie Ryan on the front of the breakaway on stage 9 at La Vuelta, one of three longrange moves he made off the front on Grand Tour debut (Photo: Antonio Baixauli)<\/p>\n