With the Giro d’Italia in the rear-view mirror, attention has quickly turned to the second Grand Tour of the season and the biggest race of the year, the Tour de France.
The start of the race in Lille is just over a month away, and the top contenders are all putting their final touches on preparation for July, training at altitude around Europe and taking on final racing outings this month.
Alongside the Tour de Suisse, the Critérium du Dauphiné is one such traditional Tour warm-up, with the eight-stage race welcoming a swathe of big names next week (June 8-15).
The top two Tour favourites, Tadej Pogačar and Jonas Vingegaard, line up as the biggest names on the start list in France, as they will for the Tour, but there are a host of other top contenders lining up, too, including a certain Remco Evenepoel.
Cyclingnews has combed through the start list to analyse all the big contenders for the win, the podium, and the top 10 at the Dauphiné ahead of the race start on Sunday.
Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG)
Tadej Pogačar has been close to unbeatable so far in 2025, but his biggest test ahead of the Tour de France will come at the Critérium du Dauphiné, where he and Jonas Vingegaard will face off for the first time this season.
The pair have been training at altitude in Sierra Nevada, Spain, recently, so it will be interesting to gauge their levels before the pair head back to altitude ahead of the Tour start in Lille on July 5.
World champion Pogačar has seven wins in 14 race days this year, including triumphs at the UAE Tour, Strade Bianche, Tour of Flanders, and Liège-Bastogne-Liège. He’s only raced the Dauphiné once before, finishing fourth in 2020, so this is a chance to add a new race to his palmarès.
He’ll be joined by a support squad including Marc Soler, Pavel Sivakov, Jhonatan Narváez, and Tim Wellens in France, many of whom will be with him at the Tour.
Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease A Bike)
The Dauphiné is a rare outing for Jonas Vingegaard in 2025, with the Dane having taken on only two races so far this season, the Volta ao Algarve and Paris-Nice.
He crashed out of the latter, suffering a concussion which ruled him out of March’s Volta a Catalunya, too. As a result, Vingegaard has only logged 10 race days in 2025 and will have been away from racing for three months once the Dauphiné kicks off in Domérat.
He, of course, took the win in the Algarve and was in the fight for victory in Paris-Nice before his stage 5 crash, too. It remains to be seen how months of training with no racing have prepared him for a first matchup against Pogačar since last July.
A strong Visma-Lease A Bike team, including Sepp Kuss, Matteo Jorgenson, Attila Valter, and Victor Campenaerts, will be backing Vingegaard at the race.
Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep)
Much attention will be given over to the ‘big two’ of Pogačar and Vingegaard next week, leaving Olympic champion Remco Evenepoel with something of a ‘best of the outsiders’ tag.
Last year’s Tour de France showed that Evenepoel isn’t yet on the level of the two men who have shared the last five Tour titles, but this Dauphiné should give an indication of his progress in catching up to them.
He’s hardly had an ideal season so far, only making his debut in April after an offseason blighted by numerous injuries suffered in a dooring incident during training. After winning Brabantse Pijl, he faded during the remainder of the Ardennes Classics before putting in a solid ride at last month’s Tour de Romandie, where he won the closing time trial.
Evenepoel will undoubtedly be aiming for another Tour podium this summer, but how close can he get to Pogačar and Vingegaard? This race may give some indication.
Carlos Rodríguez (Ineos Grenadiers)
After taking a stage win at Plateau de Glières on the final day last year and coming away with fourth overall, you’d sense that Ineos Grenadiers leader Carlos Rodríguez would be satisfied with the same outcome from the 2025 Critérium du Dauphiné.
The Spaniard, now 24, has developed into the team’s top GC rider, even if they aren’t the dominant stage racing force they once were. He’ll lead Ineos at the Dauphiné and the Tour, though his results in 2025 don’t stand out quite as much as they did last season.
The 2024 Tour de Romandie champion has a pair of sixth places to his name this season at the Volta a Valenciana and at Romandie. In a crowded field behind Pogačar, Vingegaard, and Evenepoel, he’ll do well to stand out.
Matthias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek)
Danish climber Matthias Skjelmose heads up Lidl-Trek’s selection for the Dauphiné after he won and placed third at the Tour de Suisse in previous campaigns. He’s joined in the squad by second option and former Giro winner, Tao Geoghegan Hart.
So far in 2025, he’s taken a win against Pogačar at Amstel Gold Race and finished fifth at Itzulia Basque Country, having crashed out of a podium place on the penultimate day at Paris-Nice.
Having only raced the Tour de France once before, as a 22-year-old, two years ago, the Dauphiné will offer a vital insight into Skjelmose’s progress as a major GC rider. He has fifth at the Vuelta a España last year under his belt and should be at his best for the mountainous trio of closers.
Enric Mas (Movistar)
Spaniard Enric Mas is a solid if unspectacular contender among the top of the GC pile, always there or thereabouts and a reliable results getter, even if he doesn’t often claim the wins or make spectacular attacks.
The 30-year-old has performed to expectations so far in 2025 with a third place at the Volta a Catalunya and a second at Itzulia Basque Country. He hasn’t won a race since the 2022 Giro dell’Emilia, though, and he’ll surely be hoping for that unwanted streak to come to an end soon.
Whether that will come against the likes of Pogačar and Vingegaard at the Dauphiné or the Tour, or later in the year on home ground at the Vuelta, remains to be seen. He’d be thrilled to come away with a podium place behind the ‘big two’, even if a win doesn’t materialise, however.
Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe)
Primož Roglič is off preparing for the second leg of his Giro-Tour attempt, Jai Hindley is out injured, and Aleksandr Vlasov is elsewhere preparing for the Tour, so Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe turn to German climber Florian Lipowitz for Dauphiné leadership.
The 24-year-old only broke through last season with a podium at the Tour de Romandie, a win at the Sibiu Tour, and a top-10 at the Vuelta, while this year has seen him continue his progress with a second place at Paris-Nice and fourth at Itzulia Basque Country.
His main strength lies in climbing, but he’s solid in the time trial, too, which is handy given the mid-race 17.7km test here. Lipowitz should be seen as a real podium contender next week among a competitive field, and he can continue to stake his claim to grow into the future undisputed GC leader for Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe.
Santiago Buitrago & Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious)
Bahrain Victorious will come to the Dauphiné armed with a two-pronged attack in the form of Colombian Santiago Buitrago and a new signing for 2025, French youngster Lenny Martinez.
Buitrago finished 11th here last year, while Martinez was 18th on his only participation back in 2023. Both will be hoping they can threaten the podium this time around, though Martinez has shown better form than Buitrago, who has two Grand Tour top 10s to his name, so far in 2025.
Buitrago began his year with a win at the Volta a Valenciana and second at the Tour des Alpes-Maritimes but crashed out of Paris-Nice and finished 13th at Itzulia Basque Country before taking sixth at La Flèche Wallonne.
Martinez, meanwhile, has improved during the spring, winning a stage at Paris-Nice, taking fifth in the Volta a Catalunya, and fourth at Flèche before winning a stage at the Tour de Romandie en route to second overall.
Felix Gall (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale)
Felix Gall leads Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale in the Dauphiné ahead of a return to the Tour de France, where he’ll be aiming to replicate his top-10 finish from his breakthrough season two years ago.
The Austrian won a stage and finished eighth at the Tour de Suisse in 2023 before replicating that result at the Tour, while last year he finished 10th and 14th at the two races. This time around, he’s switching up his schedule and taking on the Dauphiné rather than returning to Switzerland.
Gall hasn’t taken a win since that Tour stage at Courchevel two years ago, and his best result so far in 2025 has been third place on the final stage of Paris-Nice. He’s heading to France with a fifth place at the Tour of the Alps as his most recent result.
Honourable mentions
Beyond those 10 riders, there are more names to consider on a short list of outsiders.
22-year-old Max Poole will be aiming to carry on the momentum of an 11th place at the Giro d’Italia in France, while his Picnic-PostNL teammate Romain Bardet will hope to bow out in glory at the final race of his career.
Another French climber, Guillaume Martin, heads up Groupama-FDJ with a third career top 10 surely the goal for the 31-year-old.
Elsewhere, Eddie Dunbar heads up Jayco-AlUla as he prepares for a Tour de France debut, while Louis Meintjes will hope to score some UCI points for an Intermarché-Wanty squad looking over their shoulders at the relegation battle following a disappointing Giro.
