Eight shining stars at the Giro NextGen

The 48th edition of the U23 Giro d'Italia, now known as Giro NextGen, took place last week (15-22 June). In recent years, it has served as the biggest annual showcase for young riders and their teams and has become the best measure of youth development in this decade, as 18 of the 33 teams at the start are WorldTour or ProTeam development teams - good results and overall performance can lead straight to the highest level of cycling. 

The race has been won by such riders as Marco Pantani, Francesco Casagrande, Alexander Vlasov, Tom Pidcock and Juan Ayuso, proving that an overall victory can give the winner a chance to rise to the top with hard work and perseverance. The race also provides an excellent opportunity for the organisers to try out new routes, especially mountains, which, after successful testing, may be included in the elite Giro d'Italia route – this year, the Prarostino, located on the final circuit in Pinerolo, with an average gradient of 12.5% has the best chance of becoming such a climb.

This article presents eight riders who stood out in the 2025 Giro NextGen race. Seven of the eight riders haven’t yet signed their first professional contract; they were deliberately chosen as they are likely to have great careers in the coming years.

The route for this year's race was as follows:

Stage 1, Rho – Rho (ITT), 8.4 Km: Mostly flat time trial, perfect for creating differences. (Matthias Schwarzbacher was the winner)

Stage 2, Rho Fiera Milano – Cantù, 146 Km: Lumpy, provisionally seen as a sprint stage, with Jonathan Vervenne ultimately winning it with a 61 km solo breakaway

Stage 3, Albese Con Cassano – Passo Del Maniva, 143 Km: The first mountainous day, won by Jarno Widar.

Stage 4, Manerbio – Salsomaggiore Terme, 148 Km: A breakaway day, won by Seth Dunwoody in a small group sprint.

Stage 5, Fiorenzuola d’Arda – Gavi, 153 Km: A crazy day that turned the general classification upside down. (Winner - Adam Rafferty)

Stage 6, Ovada – Acqui Terme, 155 Km: Another breakaway day, with Filippo Agostinacchio winning the stage.

Stage 7, Bra – Prato Nevoso, 163 Km: GC favourites battled for the victory, with Pavel Novák winning.

Stage 8, Pinerolo – Pinerolo, 141 Km: Jørgen Nordhagen won a one-on-one sprint against Jakob Omrzel.

Last year, Lotto Development Team rider Jarno Widar won with two fantastic climbing performances ahead of two Spanish talents, Pablo Torres and Pau Marti. Widar and Marti also participated in this year's race, but neither could repeat last year's performance. Marti, the Spaniard from the Israel Premier-Tech Academy team, was not in the form to repeat his excellent performance from last year. Meanwhile, Widar, despite taking the lead in the overall standings on the third day after a good start in the ITT at the Passo della Manera mountain top finish, lost the pink jersey after a crazy day full of attacks, and then had to give up the race on the penultimate day due to a crash. 

Slovenian Jakob Omrzel (Bahrain Victorious Development Team) won this year's race with a final-day attack. Australian Luke Tuckwell (Red Bull-Bora Rookies) finished second overall, and Czech rider Pavel Novák of MBH Bank Colpack Ballan also stepped on the podium in third position. The points classification was won by Frenchman Aubin Sparfel, the King of the Mountain classification by last year's junior world champion, Lorenzo Finn, and Finn’s team, Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe Rookies, won the team classification confidently.

Jakob Omrzel has become Slovenia's new star: the 19-year-old from Novo Mesto has emerged as a real treasure and force to be reckoned with over the past two months. His junior career went quite well, with multiple top-10 GC performances in races where climbing was a primary skill, third in the Tour du Pays de Vaud, and fourth in the Ain Bugey Valromey Tour. These are the two most important races on the junior calendar regarding multi-day climbing efforts and are the most comparable to the elite level. However, in Omrzel, we also greet the winner of the 2024 junior Paris-Roubaix. The question before 2025 was where Bahrain–Victorious would further develop Jakob: in the direction of classics or climbing? 

By the middle of the season, they likely have chosen climbing. The season started slowly, with his team focusing on long-term development, after all, they signed a two-year contract with him at the end of last year. The first two months were about getting used to the U23 category, but from April onwards, he started to achieve remarkable results in the Circuit des Ardennes and the Giro del Belvedere. Then, the world learned his name at the Tour of Slovenia, where he finished fourth in the general classification and showed great tactical maturity against WorldTour-level rivals. 

This maturity was also seen in this race. Although he did not perform at his best on the Passo della Manera, he did not panic. He made a decisive move on stage 5, after which he gave his best on the Prato Nevoso, climbing up to second in the standings, 11 seconds behind the maglia rosa at the end of the day. On the last day, he attacked and made up for his deficit in the last 10 kilometres to win the 2025 edition of the Giro Next Gen. In Omrzel, Slovenian cycling has found a new star who, in just six months, has reached one of the highest peaks in the category, and deservedly so.

Red Bull–Bora–Hansgrohe Rookies arrived at their first Giro Next Gen with a powerful team. Two key climbers from Trinity Racing joined last year's junior world champion Lorenzo Finn: British rider Callum Thornley and Australian Luke Tuckwell, who both joined the team last year after Trinity was unfortunately disbanded. However, this article focuses on Tuckwell, who, after a crazy tactical battle, was able to take the maglia rosa and wear it on his birthday during Saturday's queen stage in Prato Nevoso. 

Many people compared Tuckwell to Rafał Majka because of his loyalty, domestique and mountain skills, and this role was already apparent when he joined the team. Another factor in his favour was that he immediately started competing professionally in Spain, where he could train alongside Maxim van Gils and Roger Adrià and took his first steps here as a helper. After his first professional attempts, he returned to the U23 level in April, significantly assisting Lorenzo Finn in his victories. Still, he also finished in the top 15 himself several times, indicating that he can be close to the top on his own merit. 

His team started this Giro Next Gen campaign with Finn as captain, with the best mountain domestique line-up behind him, and this made all the difference. This was evident in the first mountain finish, as all three members of the trio mentioned at the beginning of this section finished in the top 10, giving them plenty of tactical options to outmanoeuvre the other teams and cause damage to the stars of the race on a semi-difficult stage. 

This is precisely what happened, and on day 5, Tuckwell got into a perfect and strong breakaway and took the lead in the general classification with a 26-second advantage, which he defended on Prato Nevoso. On the final day, however, despite fighting hard, he could not keep up with the pace of the eventual winner, Omrzel, on the final 500-metre climb, and was pushed into second place by a small margin. Regardless, it was a fantastic eight days for Tuckwell, which could soon earn him a long-term professional contract. 

Pavel Novák, a 20-year-old rider from the southern region of the Czech Republic, has been a hot name in the U23 class for three years now, especially as his performance improves annually. He has been riding for his current team since 2023, finishing sixth in his first year in the Giro Ciclistico della Valle d'Aosta, one of the most prestigious U23 Tours with many challenging climbs (the value of the race is indicated by the fact that all three members of the top 3 from two years ago now have WorldTour contracts). 

Last year, he finished fifth in the Giro NextGen and won the Trofeo Piva, a prestigious U23 one-day race. Thanks to his team's improved financial resources, Novák was able to compete in several pro races this year, most notably the Tour de Hongrie, where he achieved a sensational sixth place on GC, largely thanks to his fourth-place finish on Kékestető. He topped this with another top-5 finish at the Giro NextGen – he won Saturday's stage with a 30-kilometre solo breakaway, which greatly contributed to his third-place finish in the general classification. 

Novák is an excellent, purely puncheur-climber combination who has played a vital role in the franchise, becoming the de facto leader of the MBH Bank Colpack Ballan team. The news is that his team will become a UCI ProTeam from 2026, which means that Novák could automatically become a professional rider if he stays. Still, after three U23 seasons, in which he has achieved such good results twice in a major Tour, he can dream even bigger. Even if not from 2026, he will surely soon become a member of a WorldTour team.

The 19-year-old youngster from Lombardy is one of this year's most significant youth discoveries, participating in a powerful U23 programme entirely separate from the VF Group–Bardiani ProTeam programme, and Turconi has flourished in this role, blossoming and showing tremendous improvement in his second U23 season. 

It would not be easy to list all his results this year. Still, without claiming to be exhaustive, after Novák, he won the 2025 edition of Trofeo Piva and had three top-8 results in the Italian U23 series in April. A fourth place followed this in the Fleche Ardennaise, behind Widar and Finn, and in May he finished third in the general classification at the Orlen Nations Grand Prix, showing that he can stay in top form for more than just one day. 

The Giro NextGen was another step forward for him. He raced very smartly, finishing in the top 10 on the first mountain top finish, then temporarily climbing onto the GC podium on Thursday's stage 5, and holding his own well enough on the last two critical days to finish fifth overall as the best Italian rider in the race.

A top 5 general classification is a fantastic result for Turconi. However, more importantly, he was able to complement his previous very good puncheur and sprinter skills with long, 30+ minute climbs in this race, and at a very high level. He has a contract with his current team until the end of 2027, so there is a good chance we will see him in the elite Giro d'Italia as early as next year. If he continues to develop at this pace, he could be Bardiani's next star candidate in the long term.

Ireland had a fantastic race at this year's Giro NextGen, with Seth Dunwoody and Adam Rafferty winning on two consecutive days. However, the fact that Dunwoody was doing all this as a neo-U23 puts him ahead on the list regarding his current potential. Seth is a homegrown talent who spent his junior years with the Cannibal Victorious team, where he learned two skills in two years: time trialling and sprinting – and, in line with modern sprinting trends, he excelled at sprinting on the most challenging terrain. 

He achieved excellent results in the classics during his junior years, winning the junior edition of the E3 Saxo Classic in 2024. Although the junior edition of the race has fewer cobblestone sections than the elite edition, even at this level, Bahrain could be confident that they were getting someone who could solve their problems in the Classics, even in the short term.

However, Dunwoody's 2025 season shows that he will likely be a sprinter who competes attractively and can occasionally handle the more demanding climbs. He owes his victories this year to the latter skillset: in April, he won the final stage of the French 2.2 race Circuit des Ardennes, which included an almost 2,500-metre positive altitude, while at the Giro NextGen, he won a stage from the breakaway that had an 8 kilometre-long climb with an average gradient of 5% near the finish – not every sprinter could have survived that. 

Dunwoody is still raw and cannot always finish among the best in every sprint, which is perhaps his main area for improvement currently. I would not be surprised if the Development team extended his contract soon, but he is well on his way to becoming the next great Irish sprinter, following in the footsteps of Sam Bennett, in a nation more recently well-known for its climbers (Nicolas Roche, Eddie Dunbar, Ben Healy).

The elder of two brothers in a cycling family from an unusual cycling location: Filippo comes from the north-western corner of Italy, Valle d'Aosta, a very hilly, mountainous area. The average fan might assume that this region produces many good climbers and mountain bikers. However, the Agostinacchio family, including younger brother Mattia, who is racing among juniors pretty successfully, approach the sport from the direction of cyclocross. Filippo's results in this field are impressive: he is a multiple Italian junior champion, and last year he won silver at the U23 European Championships, which is, of course, an outstanding achievement. As he prioritised his 'cross career over road racing for a long time, he did record any exceptional road results until this year. However, it was noteworthy that he competed in the domestic elite UCI gravel races and finished in the top 11 on both occasions. 

In 2025, he joined a new team, which did him good. Marco Milesi and Dario Nicoletti, two former great Italian cyclists, took Filippo under their wing at Biesse–Carrera and built up his road career, giving him an excellent opportunity to combine the engine required for cyclocross with a good punch – this played a massive role on stage 6, which he won after a superb solo breakaway, producing Italy's first victory in two years at the Giro NextGen. The emotions on Agostinacchio's face after this said it all: this was a grandiose success for the Italian. This victory could open the way for a professional career, and it would be even better if he could do this in a team with his brother, Mattia.

Patrick Frydkjær was the accurate metronome of the 2022-23 junior class, having been incredibly consistent throughout his two junior years, finishing in the top 10 on 24 of a total of 49 UCI race days, which is nearly a 50% rate. The development structures and teams that were emerging at the time competed fiercely for him, and in the end, the then-forming Lidl-Trek team signed him for two years, with huge expectations for the future. However, his first year was marred by misfortune and crashes, and he could not immediately adapt to the U23 level. Nevertheless, the team gave Patrick their full faith and trust, internally and publicly, claiming he would repay these efforts entirely in 2025. 

The Danish sprinter has already achieved nine top-10 finishes this year, including second place in the U23 edition of Gent-Wevelgem and two top-5 finishes at the Giro NextGen, making the most of the few opportunities when there was a real chance for a sprint in the race. Frydkjær's strength is his top speed, which he is now demonstrating in his second U23 season. If he remains with Lidl-Trek after 2025, his team can continue its tradition of sprinters following in the footsteps of Mads Pedersen, Jonathan Milan and Tim Torn Teutenberg. With a good second half of 2025, he can secure his future.

The final rider featured in this article has had a very unusual career path, which few have chosen in the 2020s. Until the end of 2024, Pierre-Henry Basset followed the average career path of French riders: he started at club level in a local Breton club (where he rode in a team with his brother and several current ProTour riders), then in 2024 he signed with CIC U Nantes Atlantique at Continental level, where he became one of the best riders on his team at the age of 20. He won the U23 GP Plouay, finished fifth in La Polynormande - which counts towards the French Cup - and 15th in the rainy and muddy Paris-Tours. With such results to his palmares, the only question in the second half of last year was whether he would become the team's fully-fledged captain in 2025 or move up to the ProTour with a professional contract. 

However, to everyone's surprise, Basset chose the XDS Astana Development team, which was interesting because only two riders (Remy di Gregorio and Clement Champoussin) from his home country had competed in the team in the past 15 years; he chose a statistically unorthodox path for himself. As for the results, Basset won this year's Tour of Rhodes 2.2 stage race, the first stage race victory of his career – after that, however, he played more of a domestique role, and it should be added that he raced a lot this year, he arrived at the Giro Next Gen with 36 days under his belt, so fatigue probably played a role in his weaker spring. 

However, the past week has been a great success for him: Basset had a truly consistent race, which indicates that he was able to find his feet in the chaos of the strategies, and although he "only” finished 13th in the general classification, he was able to make considerable progress in the race – and that is the main point of these U23 events.

This was the Giro NextGen. The best of the U23 category will compete in Aosta in July before moving on to the most important race of the year, the Tour de L'Avenir, which will take place between 23 and 30 August. Stay tuned for further reports from the U23 circuit here at Domestique.