Top talents to watch out for in 2023: Andrea Piccolo from the EF Education EasyPost team
Andreas Kublik
· 07.01.2023
Info about Andrea Piccolo
- Date of birth: 23/03/2001
- Nationality: Italian
- Height/weight: 1.82 m, 64 kg
Teams
- 2020 Team Colpack Ballan
- 2021 (until 31 May) Astana-Premier Tech
- 2021 Viris Vigevano
- 2022 (until 1 March) Gazprom-Rusvelo
- 2022 (from 24/06 to 31/07) Drone Hopper - Androni Giocattoli
- 2022 (since 1 August) to date EF Education EasyPost
Andrea Piccolo, 21 years old, EF Education EasyPost
Small but mighty? Andrea Piccolo, small but 1.82 metres tall, has long been regarded as a promising talent. On the extremely difficult time trial course at the 2018 World Championships in Innsbruck, he took bronze in the junior time trial behind the outstanding Remco Evenepoel. Then his career came to a standstill.
According to reports, he did not feel comfortable with the Astana World Tour team in 2021, switched to a small team in his home country of Italy after a short time and started again. The 2022 season was also bumpy: his new team Gazprom was no longer able to start due to the Russian sanctions, he initially switched to the second-class Italian racing team Drone Hopper, where his strong performances recommended him for a move to the World Tour team EF Education EasyPost for the second half of the season.
In autumn, he achieved top results at the Tour of Lombardy and the Japan Cup. It could be that the style-conscious Italian, who already looks like a star with his cool sunglasses, will soon stand out on the big stage. His role model: Vincenzo Nibali. His dream: victory in the Giro d'Italia. When the young man from Magenta finally has some peace and quiet from the team search ...
Cycling talents: TOUR shows 10 promotion candidates for 2023
TOUR editor Andreas Kublik takes a look at ten young riders who will be worth watching in 2023. We present the individual candidates in our series. Almost all of the selected riders are already under contract with a World Tour team. Signing cyclists at a very young age is a trend that has recently caught on with the top teams.
Numerous youngsters skip the U23 class and go straight into the professional ranks. The most prominent example of this development is Remco Evenepoel. The Belgian was under contract with Deceuninck - Quick Step in 2019 at the age of just 18. Since then, he has worked his way up to the top of the world rankings, including becoming road world champion in 2022.
Many top teams also have their own junior racing team, where they train their talents and later bring them into the professional squad. A prime example of this is the Groupama-FDJ team in 2023, which has recruited all seven new riders for this year from the Equipe continentale Groupama-FDJ.
Andreas Kublik
Editor
