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Hello and welcome back to Global Peloton’s free bi-weekly newsletter!
I’ve wanted to interview Nic Dlamini for a long time. His story gripped me long before he became the first black South African to race the Tour de France in 2021. Dlamini comes from a township in the Western Cape, where prospects for young people are low. Most who are born there never leave, unemployment is sky-high and so is crime. It can be a dark place to be.
After retiring from cycling in 2022 through illness, Dlamini now feels in a place to invest back into the sport, and wants to create a new pathway for young people across South Africa, whatever their background, to become professional cyclists.
We had a long and insightful conversation about Dlamini’s life, his career as a pro rider and Live Your Dream, his brand new cycling team. You can read it here.
In the newsletter today, news on plans for the return of the Vuelta Mexico in 2027, which will not include a women’s race. Also, the impact of Hurricane Melissa forces cancellation of a race in Jamaica, Milkias Maekele’s Ineos Grenadiers debut and much more.
Enjoy the newsletter,
Dan
Recent posts:
- Vuelta a Mexico to return in 2027, and organisers want Del Toro and UAE to come
- Faulkner and Soto Campos among winners at Pan-American Championships
- From the township to the Tour: Nic Dlamini is helping young South Africans follow his path
Last week, Global Peloton broke the news over on Escape Collective that the historic Vuelta a Mexico will return to the UCI calendar in 2027, with race organisers hoping to attract Isaac del Toro and UAE Team Emirates-XRG to attend.
The Union Ciclista de Mexico is bringing the race back as part of a move to capitalise on the increased popularity of cycling in the country thanks to Del Toro’s meteoric rise since winning the 2023 Tour de l’Avenir.
However, when asked whether an equivalent women’s race would also be held, the Union Ciclista de Mexico’s President Bernardo de la Garza said that a women’s race would not be financially viable at this stage due to a lack of interest from potential investors.
“We want to have a women's race, but I think it's hard for us right now,” De la Garza said. “To assemble all the partners that you need…I mean, I want to be honest: We feel and we believe we have as much talent in the women as we have in the men, but we haven't had that big name. We want to work on having big names also in women's cycling. Right now, it would be hard, I want to be honest, commercially, to gather all the partners that you need for that kind of level of race. But we do want to have races, international races, for the women as well in Mexico.”
Mexico currently has one professional rider in the women’s peloton, Romina Hinojosa, who races for Lotto-Intermarché-Ladies.
You can read Global Peloton’s full story on the return of the Vuelta a Mexico on Escape Collective.
He’s viewed as Eritrea’s top emerging talent, built in the mould of Biniam Girmay, and youngster Milkias Maekele made his first appearance in an Ineos Grenadiers jersey last week at the Coppi e Bartali stage race.
Maekele played a supporting role as part of a young team in Italy as he raced for the WorldTour squad, stepping up from the Ineos Grenadiers Racing Academy. The team was led by experienced Frenchman Axel Laurance, who won two stages and placed second overall behind Jayco-AlUla’s Mauro Schmid.
The 20-year-old’s best personal result was 35th on the second stage as part of Laurance’s lead-out. He finished the race in 106th place on General Classification and said after the race that it was a “great experience racing with the WorldTour guys, learned a lot and felt the level. More to come.”
Maekele signed for the brand new Ineos Grenadiers Racing Academy this season after an impressive year with the German Bike Aid team in 2025. A training crash postponed his season start, but the sprinter is now on the road to his best form.
The Ineos Grenadiers Racing Academy will next line up at the Circuit des Ardennes stage race in France.
The Jamaica International Cycling Classic, one of only a few UCI races in the Caribbean, has been cancelled for 2026 due in part to the impact of Hurricane Melissa, which caused a great deal of damage to the country’s infrastructure in October 2025.
The race first took place in 2022, upgrading to UCI 2.2 status in 2024. The three stages of each edition so far have been based in the Montego Bay area to the north of the country. In 2025, the race was won by former Paris-Nice champion Sergio Henao.
The 2026 edition was due to take place from the 27th to the 29th of March.
“We had to cancel it for this year. We had a lot of team cancellations plus we had issues with hotel rooms due to the hurricane that we had, so it was a double whammy,” race directory Carlton Simmonds told Global Peloton.
“But it will be back for next year for sure…It will be, we have notified the UCI and our partners on it already and got the re-commitment for next year, so it’s a go for next year for sure.”
The Jamaica International Cycling Classic is a pioneering race in the region, standing next to the historic Tour de la Guadeloupe as the only UCI races in the Caribbean. The lack of racing makes the development of young riders a difficult task, with the sport growing in popularity in several Caribbean nations.
In order to make a step in their careers, riders often have to travel to other parts of North or South America, or try to find a team in Europe.
“Funding is always an issue, and to develop talent properly, it requires money,” Simmonds told me for Cyclingnews in 2024 when the race first upgraded to UCI level. “You can't stay locally; you have to come out of the space and it requires a whole lot of money to move people around to get them to high-quality races.”
“So if we can have an event where we can bring people [to race in Jamaica], it will only help to develop our regional and local riders' ability.”
The Pan-American Championships concluded in Colombia last Sunday. Chilean Catalina Soto Campos claimed the women’s elite title, while there was a shock win in the men’s road race with Costa Rica’s Jason Huertas out-sprinting the likes of Fernando Gaviria. Walter Vargas took a home victory in the men’s TT, his 7th Pan-Am title, and Kristen Faulkner won the women’s race for the USA. Read my full wrap-up of the biggest stories from Colombia.
One of Asia’s biggest stage races, the Tour of Thailand, was won by former WorldTour rider Vadim Pronskiy ahead of another, Eduardo Sepulveda. The Kazakh now races for Malaysian continental team Terengganu, who took two more stages through Pierre Barbier. The Chinese Li Ning team took the other three stages of the race through Alex Salby and Cameron Scott.
The three-stage Women’s Tour of Thailand is also underway, finishing on Thursday. The opening stage was won by Valeriya Zakharkina.
In Türkiye, the hilly GP Syedra Ancient City one day race was won by another Kazakh, Rudolf Remkhi. Team Amani were impressive as the team takes part in its first block of Turkish races. Amaniel Desta followed up from his 4th place at the Tour du Rwanda by finishing 5th, Ugandan Shafik Mugalu was 6th and Samuel Niyonkuru 8th.
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