'All the kids called him dad’ - Brennan’s former coach on his early leadership

“He wrote to me after his victory to tell me that he knew every metre of the final thanks to those years,” Pidcock said to L'Equipe, referring to Brennan’s win at Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne.

Giles Pidcock, father of Pinarello-Q36.5 rider Tom Pidcock, recalls another defining moment from Brennan’s development.

“I remember a race, he had crashed on a cobbled sector and had to stay on the ground for at least five minutes, his leg was hurting too much,” he said. “But he eventually got back on his bike and managed to come back to the peloton after about thirty kilometres. It was brilliant. You learn a lot about a rider in that kind of situation.”

Now riding for Team Visma | Lease a Bike, the Britton has already secured 14 professional victories at just 20 years old, with 12 of them coming in his breakthrough 2025 season.

Pidcock said Brennan’s early inconsistency had initially raised questions within the team. “During the first 18 months with us, he was performing, but we could see that his performances were declining as the big races approached,” he explained. “We thought he simply lacked training, or even talent, or that he was not eating properly during races.”

The explanation came shortly before Brennan stepped up to WorldTour level. “He is affected by coeliac disease, which prevents him from absorbing nutrients based on gluten,” Pidcock said. “So he was racing without energy and still managing to perform.”

According to Pidcock, the impact of that diagnosis was immediate. “We then saw him take a big step forward,” he said. “In his first year at Visma, he became a different man and put on weight.”

Pidcock also emphasised Brennan’s natural power profile. “He is a little bull who likes to use big gears, but not with a high pedalling cadence,” he said.

Beyond physical ability, Brennan’s mindset stood out early in his career. “He has always had the curiosity to understand why things are the way they are,” Pidcock said. “I think that trait fits well with the Visma model, the scientific, prescriptive approach.”

“When Matty arrived, all the kids called him ‘dad’ because he was the sensitive one, exemplary, the leader who gave advice,” his former coach recalled. “I remember long journeys, he would sit at the front and we would talk about everything, politics, economics, the world.”

Brennan heads into this weekend’s major cobbled test as one of the key riders for Team Visma | Lease a Bike, alongside Wout van Aert and Christophe Laporte.