'Cycling can become the second sport of Africa' - Inside the 20-year journey to build a pro pathway

When Biniam Girmay (Eritrea) won the green jersey in 2024, he did not just make history as the first African to win the points classification at the Tour de France. He made visible what had been building quietly for over 20 years. When Kim Le Court (Mauritius) pulled on the yellow jersey at the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift in 2025, she pulled the awareness of African cycling to an even higher level. 

Africa Rising, the non-profit which has worked for two decades with hundreds of African athletes in the gaps between riders, local clubs, national federations, and the pro peloton, now finds itself at a critical juncture. 

There were more African riders in the pro ranks than American riders in 2025. There are now Zwift hubs across the continent aiming to produce more WorldTour talent. There are seven UCI teams now registered across Africa. There is a first-ever professional contract in the women's peloton for a rider from Benin. And there now is a generation of young people who have seen someone who looks like them competing on the biggest stage in cycling. Things are looking good.

Jeremy Ford has been part of Africa Rising, the non-profit supporting professional African cycling, since 2015. They have watched the sport move from a handful of isolated pioneers to a pan-continental presence. 

He works closely with its CEO Kimberly Coats, who joined the initiative in April 2009, and several other passionate supporters in various roles. These guys truly believe they make a difference, ‘walking the walk’ as they say when others talk. They get their hands dirty regularly, as that is often what is needed.

They have been Sport Directors for national teams at the Worlds, spent months working on negotiating visas for riders, they bring in hundreds of kilos of equipment on every trip to the continent (Jamie Bissell, the legendary New Zealand-born mechanic who has worked across the continent for over a decade recently travelled solo with 120kg of equipment in his suitcases), they shoot ProCyclingStats profile photos at Continental races for any riders without one, and helped negotiate dozens of pathways to the UCI World Cycling Centre. 

Africa Rising has been building pathways for African cyclists for 20 years by working to fill the gaps between riders, local clubs, national federations, the UCI World Cycling Centre, and pro teams. 

The idea is that the group steps in when systems fail, are corrupt or simply don't exist across Africa. It helps young athletes get their data seen and use modern tools to reach the next level. Now, after 20 years, the focus is on building a larger and earlier pipeline that can carry thousands more riders toward professional contracts.

Speaking to Domestique, Jeremy Ford reflects on the evolution of African cycling from the perspective of someone who has viewed many of its chapters unfold. It has been a long journey. He remembers when African riders in the professional ranks were rare and achievements at WorldTour level felt isolated. 

"For a long time, maybe 10 years or so, there weren't many," Ford says. A key moment was in 2009 when Doug Ryder's MTN Energade brought Adrien Niyonshuti from Rwanda into the top tier. 

"He was the first Black African in the cycling world. And that was a catalyst." Many Eritrean and other riders followed. In 2015, Daniel Teklehaimanot wore the polka-dot jersey at the Tour de France, two years after Daryl Impey had become the first man from the African continent to wear the yellow jersey in 2013.

Biniam Girmay's success in the 2020s has changed the dynamic still further. He spent time with the World Cycling Centre, trained alone through the COVID pandemic in Europe and signed with the Belgian outfit Intermarché, quickly establishing himself as their leading light. 

Girmay became the first-ever Black African rider to win a WorldTour one-day race at the 2022 Gent-Wevelgem, and he proceeded to win a Giro d'Italia stage that same season. 

Two years later, Girmay became the first Black African rider to win a stage of the Tour de France, and he proceeded to win the green jersey in Nice.

They have also seen what happens when a commentator does not know how to describe a Black rider on a Tour podium

Ford recalls a phone call that captured the significance of the moment. He was near the finish line when the commentator urgently reached out, unsure how to correctly describe Girmay and his historic breakthrough. "I said, look, just call him a Black athlete because this isn't just an African moment. This is a global moment," Ford explains. 

Later that evening, Girmay spoke to the same commentator and made his own choice about identity. "Biniam said, ‘Actually, I want to be called Black African because I don't want to lose this moment for Africa,’ which I thought was a wonderful thing for him to say."

The moment had an impact in ways Ford had never anticipated. "Of course our African network exploded, but we had messages from kids in America, Belgium, France, across the world. It was kids going, oh, I've never seen a Black man on the podium of the Tour de France." 

The photo of Girmay in green on the final podium in Nice was a crowning moment. "I think Biniam himself said something like I've opened the door and it was a great thing," Ford says.

The number of African riders now involved in cycling tells another part of the story. "We did have 140 African riders out there, you know, in WorldTour, Pro Conti, Conti teams in 2025," he says. To put that in context, I think the equivalent number for the USA was like 52 or something like that. So, well over double the number of Africans as Americans." 

But Ford is clear-eyed about the challenges still faced. Girmay's 2025 season was tougher at Intermarché - Wanty, and he doesn't sugarcoat it. 

"In all honesty, 2025 wasn't a vintage year. He was struggling a little bit,” he says. "The sport is super sophisticated. So he hit 2024, you know, incredible Tour de France, but it's like soccer, right? People watch the videos back. So they all worked out where the Intermarché train was, where Biniam was." 

Intermarché did not always have the lead out that other teams had, and rivals adjusted their tactics. That helped push Girmay to move teams to NSN for 2026, and Ford is cautiously optimistic about what comes next. 

"We're all hoping 2026 is going to be a pretty, pretty epic year for him. But the reality is now he's just one of a group of four or five top sprinters in the world, and only one can win."

The biggest shift inside Africa Rising might be how it now shapes a rider's journey from the very beginning. "Africa Rising has always existed sort of between the riders, the clubs, the federations in each country, and then with the UCI and the World Cycling Centre and then the big teams,” Ford says, noting that the first goal is to get a promising 15 to 18-year-old good enough to be invited to the World Cycling Centre (WCC) in Paarl, South Africa, where coaches test riders on the track and on the road. 

"If they're good enough, they then go up to Aigle, the World Cycling Centre in Switzerland. And when you're on that journey from South Africa to Switzerland, like teams start to know, because the UCI is always talking to the teams about these guys.”

When federations are not doing their job, Africa Rising Cycling calls the WCC directly and vouches for riders. "If the federation isn't really up to it, we'll tell that centre in South Africa that this kid's good enough, " he says. "And because we've been doing it 20 years, you know, JP Van Zyl, the guy that runs that centre, trusts our judgment."

There is also the everyday work of making a young athlete look and feel professional. Ford always checks riders have proper and thorough profiles on ProCyclingStats. "It may sound like small stuff but at every race I go to, if there's Africans there, I'm doing headshots for them, linking their socials, because they may never have seen it," he says.

He helps them link their TrainingPeaks, Strava, and Instagram. The reason is simple and strategic. "I tell them its vital to get your Training Peaks on there, your Strava on there, get your Instagram on there, " Ford says. "You've got to look pro because someone Googles your name. The first result that comes up is ProCyclingStats, right?"

“When Tsige Kahsay Kiros, the 18-year-old Ethiopian rider, lit up the Women’s junior road race at the Worlds, her PCS profile hits went up by 3,000 views! We already knew she was going to be a star having spotted her in 2024, so we made sure her PCS profile had a great photo of her in her Mesfin Engineering Team kit, her bio has her height, weight, age, her results were tidy and her Strava was on there. A month later, she signed a 3-year pro contract."

Social reach matters too, and Ford has seen it tip contract decisions. "Look at someone like Kiya Rigora from Ethiopia, I mean, if you go to that guy's TikTok, it's pretty spectacular. He has like 50,000 followers," he says, noting that such a presence can make a difference when a team is choosing between prospects. 

"Nowadays, for a team, you know, because again, if you broaden out and look at sport media, they only really cover the winners of bike races, right? Not many folk talk about who came second, third, fourth. So to be able to say to a team, well, yeah, I know this is an African rider and that will come with some issues around visas etc, but they've got 50,000 followers on social media."

The COVID-19 pandemic created an unlikely breakthrough opportunity for riders from the African continent. With racing on pause, in 2020 the Masaka Cycling Club in Uganda got into virtual training and racing. 

"By total chance, they launched a Zwift program. They were like, actually, this Zwift thing looks quite helpful. There's no races, so we can sort of keep going with Zwift. They're now one of the top 30 Zwift teams in the world, right? And they came out of the middle of nowhere in Uganda."

Ford credits Africa Rising CEO, Kimberly Coates, with naming what happened during that period. "She calls it the democratisation of cycling. Because at that point in 2020, no one was doing anything. So suddenly, Pogačar is on Zwift, the Benin guys, the Ugandans, the South Africans are on Zwift. So you had this complete levelling that had never happened before in cycling."

Before that moment, the path to being noticed was narrow and expensive. Ford uses Louis Meintjes as an example. "He is the most prolific African rider in Grand Tours in history, he hit Belgium at 17. He didn't get a contract until he was 21, " Ford says. 

"So he was literally in the rain, in the cold, doing those races for €10 a win, you know, for two or three years, because he knew that back then you had to race in Belgium because the coaches and the scouts were in that part of the world."

During the shutdown, talent became visible from anywhere. 

"With Zwift and any kind of other online racing, suddenly, coaches are like, hang on, that kid's doing eight watts per kilo for 10 minutes!, Some of them are generating crazy watts," Ford says.

"We created the concept of Virtual Performance Centres (VPCs) with Wahoo and Zwift e-hubs; now in a good number of countries, and the leverage on them is incredible. We can put 30 kids through training on a Zwift hub. One Zwift hub, no punctures, no major issues with lubrication, maintenance, no issues about having power meters, all the things that for us in the West are easy. We realised, this is a game changer."

The World Championships in Rwanda offered a clear picture of what still needs work. Ford was directing the Benin national team and was following some dropped African riders in the elite women's race, when they hit the brutal cobbled climb. He watched something that crystallised the next phase of the work. 

"They were grinding and a Swiss rider, I think it was Marlon Reusser, had been in the cars doing something and just came by and just glided up this climb like just like beautifully riding a bike, and I was sat there with the coach going, we still have a lot of basics to do on cadence and power management and stuff like this."

That moment led to a change in Africa Rising’s thinking for 2026. "So we had a bit of a reset and said, you know what, we need to go hard on expanding the VPC project across the continent.  2026 is going to be about getting the basics nailed and maybe a thousand or more kids on Zwift in that e-world, the coaches can walk around the studio and give real-time advice," Ford says. 

Read more about the Virtual performance centres. 

The advantage is immediate feedback. When riders train in places like Benin or with Masaka, the coaches are in the room watching data in real time. "The coaches are in the room, right? " Ford says. "And they're looking at cadence data. They can just go, actually speed up, slow down, do this, do this. You can't do that on the road.

“It never replaces real-life racing. You still have to learn racecraft, know how to get your elbows out, all of that. But it gives them a foundation. Then you can go to a Canyon SRAM zondacrypto Generation team, or one of those teams, and say: ‘Give them a shot. They’ve got the power, they’ve got the cadence, they understand the bike. They just need racecraft and that’s what you guys can give them.’”

Africa Rising are aiming to have over a dozen VPCs active by mid-2026, with new projects coming online in Algeria, Zambia, Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya and elsewhere.

The model is already producing firsts. "Masaka [Uganda], had a rider join Canyon SRAM [Florence Nakagwa] two years ago and her main racing had been Zwift," he says. 

"Benin has a rider called Georgette Vignonfodo who is joining a Conti team for 2026. The majority of their racing and training has been on Zwift. She is the first-ever Beninoise rider to ever get a pro contract."

There is a bigger vision beyond the next contract. Ford recalls a conversation with UCI president David Lappartient at the Tour of Rwanda, where he was talking to the media about the forthcoming World Championships, and he decided to push a bigger idea. "I said, 'Look, David, everyone knows the Worlds are going to be in Rwanda the first time in Africa, right? We've had three or four years of that message. Start saying to people, cycling can become the second sport of Africa.'"

Football will always be number one, Ford acknowledges, but cycling is growing across the continent in a way few other sports can match. "You've got cyclists from Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco in the north, Benin and Nigeria in the west, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Uganda in the east. You got South Africa and Namibia in the south. So it is the sport that actually is pan-African. There aren't many other sports really there that can say, we're present in every part of the continent."

Girmay and Kim Le Court has shown that a path to the WorldTour is real. "I think that's why Biniam and Kim Le Court and many others are so important," he says. "Because it's showing those kids that are potentially a WorldTour rider, it's not just that one path into soccer."

He saw the football infrastructure firsthand when he was walking along a beach in Gambia a few years ago. "I could see the Real Madrid training camp. I could see Chelsea, Barcelona, and Bayern Munich," he says. "They have these regional hubs all the way down that coastline. And there are kids from Senegal, Ghana, Gambia, all going up there to try and get a gig with a pro team in Europe." 

Football has built that system over decades, and cycling is building it now. "And I think that's the change that Biniam and Kim and others are making, Mum's and dads are seeing it's now a viable sport route for a lot of African young people."

It is why we have active social media accounts on all channels, we need to constantly show this is an exciting pathway for young African athletes. We just launched a podcast for 2026 to hit that space too."

Money still matters, of course. "Like every sport, right? Money is one of the most important things. You have to have money for resources," he says. "You've got to find sponsors, pay riders and coaches. You've got to have the opportunities to show what you've got." 

But he thinks cycling is starting to learn to value reach and community in the way football does. "I'm a Liverpool fan. We buy a player for €100 million. When you look at the price, the management are also thinking how high profile this athlete is, how many shirts are we going sell with that guy's name on around the world…"

Nowadays In cycling, social presence and storytelling are now a part of how riders are assessed. Ford explains why Africa Rising leans into that reality as well. "It could be a decision point of a Belgian kid, a Dutch kid, a French kid who no one's ever heard or an African that's got 50,000 followers," he says. "So that could be the thing that tips it over. You know, that's the modern world."

With nearly 70 African men and women signed to WorldTour, Pro Continental and Continental teams already for this year (as of 25 January) - including nine National Champions from across the continent – Africa Rising focusing on their Virtual Performance Center expansion, and potentially seven Continental teams from Africa out there, 2026 promises to be another major chapter in African cycling and we hope to see riders from the continent racing - and winning – worldwide. African cycling is truly rising.