Neilson Powless opens his 2026 campaign on Friday at Tour de la Provence but after injury stymied the EF Education-EasyPost rider’s off-season build the early focus will not be on chasing his own victories; instead he will be supporting new signings Michael Leonard and Luke Lamperti as the two hunt stage wins across three days in France.
Powless is now 29 but is now in his ninth WorldTour season and seventh with EF Education-EasyPost so is “shifting professional ambition” to “share some of my knowledge” with a group of riders between 20-23.
“My form is improving but it ended up being a 12-week off season so it was quite long. I injured my knee and created tendonitis off the injury so I had to sort of halt my training. I’m four weeks into training and just trying to build my fitness up again. It just took a really long time for that to heal,” Powless said in a team press release.
“Races are very motivating for me. It’s going to be three good, hard days of racing. We’re going with Luke [Lamperti] for sprinting ambitions and Michael [Leonard] for the climbing stage. I’ll be there to support the team and hopefully come out of the race better than I went in and want to keep on improving for the rest of the spring.”
“At Provence, we’re going for stage wins. We have clear goals for each day which is the reason why I’m going. I’m not really going for a result myself but it’s really motivating to help my teammates try to achieve a result and help the team. Even if my fitness isn’t great, I think I’ve become a rider who’s able to contribute a lot of value even just by supporting other riders on the team,” he said.
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