Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe will go to the 2027 Tour de France chasing the yellow jersey with Remco Evenepoel at the front, head of sports Zak Dempster has told Domestique Cycling in a year-end review of the Belgian’s first season at the team.
Dempster’s read of his new rider is direct.
“I mean, he’s an intense guy, you know, he really prioritises winning. So in everything he does, winning is at the forefront,” Dempster said to Domestique Cycling.
Fourteen victories back that up. Evenepoel’s debut Red Bull season included the Amstel Gold Race in April, the European road race title, a fourth consecutive men’s world time trial championship in Montreal, and two Tour de France stage wins on the way to second overall behind Tadej Pogacar.
The marquee moment came on 19 July, when Evenepoel outsprinted Pogacar and Isaac del Toro atop the Plateau de Solaison on Stage 15 for his first mountain-stage win at the Tour. Jonas Vingegaard crashed out of the race the same day, lifting Evenepoel to second overall, five minutes behind Pogacar.
A 68-day reset before the Tour
Not every month ran that way. Evenepoel underperformed at the UAE Tour and the Volta a Catalunya in the spring, and finished third at both his Tour of Flanders debut and Liège-Bastogne-Liège, two races he had been expected to attack.
Red Bull tore up the May and June calendar in response. Evenepoel skipped the Critérium du Dauphiné and went into a 68-day block without racing before the Tour started in Barcelona. Sports director Patxi Vila told IDL Procycling that the team wanted to control every element of the build-up.
“We want to prepare him for the Tour down to the millimetre,” Vila said to IDL Procycling.
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The plan was built by Evenepoel’s new personal coach Tim Heemskerk, who had previously worked with Vingegaard. The Belgian arrived in Barcelona lighter than in the spring, and the summer peak followed.
71km of time trial for 2027
The 2027 Tour de France route unveiled in Paris includes 71km of individual time trialling, the highest total since Bradley Wiggins won in 2012. Spread across a Blois-Chambord stage and a Toulouse circuit, it is a lot of ground for a reigning four-time world time trial champion to put climbers on the back foot.
Team manager Ralph Denk has already said the route plays to Evenepoel’s strongest asset. Dempster, meanwhile, told Domestique Cycling the 2027 focus would be on winning a Grand Tour, and that Evenepoel still had “a fair bit to say in the Classics, including at Flanders.”
Paris-Roubaix remains in the conversation as a possible debut.
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Red Bull will unveil Evenepoel’s full 2027 race programme at a media day on Mallorca on 11 December.
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