Cofidis to form women’s squad in 2022

Cofidis, who rejoined the top rank of professional cycling in 2019 to become the third French WorldTour team, will launch a women’s side in 2020. Team president Thierry Vittu made the announcement Friday in an online presentation. Cofidis will join Movistar, Team DSM, Lotto-Soudal, BikeExchange, Trek-Segafredo, Jumbo-Visma and Groupama-FDJ as WorldTour squads with affiliated women’s outfits.

In making the announcement, Vittu referred to his team’s title sponsor, a money lender, “I have the habit of saying that a sports team should be a representation of the Cofidis company. We have the men’s pro team and the paracycling section, and they reflect a good part of what the Cofidis company is, but it’s a group of 5,500 people in which the majority are women. So something is missing.”

Cofidis will likely start as a Continental team. There are nine women’s WorldTour teams: Alé BTC Ljubljana, Canyon-SRAM, Annemiek van Vleuten’s Movistar, Alison Jackson’s Liv Racing, BikeExchange, Trek-Segafredo, FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope, Leah Kirchmann’s Team DSM and Karol-Ann Canuel and Anna van der Breggen’s SD Worx, which used to be called Boels-Dolmans.

The featured rider on Cofidis’s men’s squad is Guillaume Martin, who placed 11th in last year’s Tour de France and took the mountains title in the Vuelta a España.

⛰️Mejor escalador / KOM classification?

?? @GuilmMartin

?‍♂️@TeamCOFIDIS #LaVuelta20@loterias_es pic.twitter.com/6OhQHRPlTD

— La Vuelta (@lavuelta) November 8, 2020

The team picked up nine new riders for 2021 including seasoned vet Simon Geschke.