{"id":199677,"date":"2025-08-20T09:53:22","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T09:53:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/?p=199677"},"modified":"2025-08-20T09:53:35","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T09:53:35","slug":"what-are-uae-team-emirates-xrgs-plans-for-ayuso-and-del-toro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2025\/08\/20\/what-are-uae-team-emirates-xrgs-plans-for-ayuso-and-del-toro\/","title":{"rendered":"What Are UAE Team Emirates\u2013XRG\u2019s Plans for Ayuso and del Toro?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A look at the schedules for the rest of the year of the two young UAE Team Emirates\u2013XRG stars, Juan Ayuso and Isaac del Toro, is, on the face of it, inexplicable. Ayuso is scheduled to ride in the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a, the Rwanda World Championships, the European Continental Championships, and Il Lombardia, while del Toro is done for the year, his final race having been Sunday\u2019s ADAC Cyclassics, in which he finished 42nd.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The 21-year-old Mexican featured in front of the peloton late in that race, did not crash and seemed to be in fine form. But he has apparently been shut down for the rest of the year, while the 22-year-old Ayuso has a full dance card. What\u2019s going on?<\/p>\n

Cycling fans will remember the controversy the two riders stirred in the Giro when del Toro, ostensibly riding in support of Ayuso, proved to be the better rider or was in better form than the Spaniard and UAE seemed wary of choosing a team leader until late in the race, when they finally chose del Toro. Any bad blood between the two riders, real or imagined, was washed away when Ayuso dropped out of the race on stage 18 after the last of several crashes he suffered in the race. At that point, del Toro led the Giro by 41 seconds, but Visma played a version of Muhammad Ali\u2019s rope-a-dope on stage, 20 and Simon Yates ended up winning the race with the help of Wout van Aert.<\/p>\n

Ayuso\u2019s future?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

So what\u2019s the story? What\u2019s behind Ayuso\u2019s full schedule and del Toro sitting out the rest of the year? UAE hasn\u2019t said a thing, and no rumours have floated through the peloton and beyond, so what follows is pure speculation and not to be taken for gospel.<\/p>\n

First of all, in the World and European championships, Ayuso will be riding for Spain, not the team. But I can\u2019t imagine that he\u2019d be riding those races without the blessing of his team. In addition, team leader Tadej Poga\u010dar<\/a> will be riding in both races, so it\u2019s possible \u2013 and allowed \u2013 that the Spaniard will be supporting his omnivorous Slovenian teammate to win both races.<\/p>\n

In addition, Ayuso seems to be slated to support Jo\u00e3o Almeida in the Vuelta and Poga\u010dar in Il Lombardia. With the great domestique Rafal Majka retiring at the end of this year, could UAE be grooming Ayuso to replace him? Yes, they could. They may have decided that he would be more valuable to the team as a domestique in the Grand Tours than as a pure GC rider.<\/p>\n

Poga\u010dar\u2019s future?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

But what about the plans they have for del Toro? That\u2019s a bit more complex and involves Poga\u010dar. Pogi had a tense and exhausting Tour de France. Yes, he won, but he could never really shake Jonas Vingegaard and had to deal with a lot of pressure from his Visma\u2013Lease a Bike team. He was cranky and hostile, criticising Visma for the way they rode, getting into a pushing match with Matteo Jorgenson and appearing to get his team to prevent Visma from winning a single stage. That worked for 20 stages, but Wout van Aert blew Pogi away on the final stage and added to his own legend by a riding to a victory for the ages in a setting \u2013 Montmartre \u2013 of the ages. A day after the race, Poga\u010dar told French publication L\u2019Equipe<\/a> that he is already thinking about his retirement, perhaps as early as 2028.<\/p>\n

\"Tadej<\/a>
What about the plans they have for del Toro? That\u2019s a bit more complex and involves Tadej Poga\u010dar. \u00a9 Profimedia<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019ll stop right away, but I also don\u2019t see myself continuing too long,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Los Angeles Olympics [in 2028] are a goal of mine\u00a0\u2013\u00a0that\u2019s three years away. So I might start thinking about retirement after that.\u201d<\/p>\n

He went on to say that riding in the Tour is not much fun for him. \u201cThe Tour is the biggest cycling race in the world. But it also causes a lot of stress for riders,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019d like to skip it one year to try other races, but I know that\u2019s hard to do. So yes, you\u2019ll see me at the start of the Tour next year to defend my title \u2013\u00a0very likely.\u201d That \u201cvery likely\u201d must have set off alarm bells in the UAE camp. He could have said \u201cof course I\u2019ll be back\u201d or \u201cabsolutely,\u201d but he chose to qualify with \u201cvery likely,\u201d which means \u201cthere\u2019s a chance I won\u2019t be back.\u201d<\/p>\n

And even if he rides in the Tour next year, which he absolutely will, if he wins and wins again in 2027, he will have a record six Tour wins. With the Olympics the following year, he very likely could decide not to ride the Tour again. Then UAE would have to find another rider to keep the team in clover.<\/p>\n

Del Toro\u2019s future?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

They\u2019re not looking far because they know they won\u2019t find a better rider to be the \u201cnew Poga\u010dar\u201d than del Toro. He can absolutely win a Grand Tour, which he demonstrated in the Giro before suffering a brain freeze. And I think that in a year or two, he\u2019ll be able to beat Vingegaard and Evenepoel in the Tour. He\u2019s only 21 years old and will only get better. Barring serious injury or illness, he will be the best rider in the peloton after Poga\u010dar retires. He\u2019s got the same easy smoothness and confidence on a bike as his team leader. He just needs some more explosiveness and racing wisdom.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why I think the team decided to shut him down, anoint him team-leader-in-waiting, and start preparing him to win Grand Tours, starting with the Giro next year \u2013 to give him a chance at redemption in that race and to build up his self-confidence. I need to repeat that this is all pure speculation. But if it turns out to be true, remember where you heard it first.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A look at the schedules for the rest of the year of the two young UAE Team Emirates\u2013XRG stars, Juan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99,"featured_media":199678,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[329],"tags":[7603,6699,3415,2885,831],"global-categories":[3366],"class_list":["post-199677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-road-cycling","tag-isaac-del-toro","tag-juan-ayuso","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-uae-team-emirates","tag-wout-van-aert","global-categories-cycling"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat Are UAE Team Emirates\u2013XRG\u2019s Plans for Ayuso and del Toro?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A look at the schedules for the rest of the year of the two young UAE Team Emirates\u2013XRG stars, Juan Ayuso and Isaac del Toro, is, on the face of it,\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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