Paul Magnier will turn professional with Soudal-QuickStep in 2024 after signing a three-year contract with the team. The highly-rated French rider joins his Trinity Racing companion Luke Lamperti in making the jump to the WorldTour with Patrick Lefevere’s squad.
A native of Grenoble, Magnier has excelled on the road and as a mountain biker throughout his underage career. He was a bronze medallist in the junior cross-country race at last year’s Mountain Bike World Championships in Les Gets, and he also won a pair of stages at the Giro della Lunigiana.
Magnier’s move to Trinity Racing in 2023 allowed him to gain experience at events like the Tour of Britain and O Gran Camiño, and he claimed third place in the U23 road race at the European Championships in September.
“We’ve been following Paul for quite some time now and he had a very impressive run in the junior and U23 ranks,” Lefevere said in a statement on Friday.
“He is very versatile and talented – as shown by his remarkable results across several disciplines – has a lot of potential, and at the same time, he is eager to learn and gain experience. These things make us excited and confident for the upcoming season.”
Soudal-QuickStep have fallen short of their usual standards on the cobbles over the past two seasons, but Magnier and Lamperti have been signed with an eye to bolstering their Classics squad of the future.
“This is a squad with an immense tradition when it comes to developing young riders, and as I love the Classics, I know I am in the right place,” Magnier said. “It’s incredible to be on the same team as Julian Alaphilippe, a two-time world champion, who told me great things about the Wolfpack. I already got a warm welcome here and I love it.”
Soudal-QuickStep flirted with a merger with Jumbo-Visma in September and October, but the team will now continue into 2024 and Lefevere has undertaken a considerable overhaul of the roster.
Twelve riders, including Fabio Jakobsen, Tim Declerq, Michael Mørkøv, and Florian Sénéchal have left the team, while ten new riders have been confirmed. Mikel Landa and Gianni Moscon are the only new arrivals from WorldTour teams, and the influx features eight new professionals, including four riders promoted from the Soudal-QuickStep development team.
Earlier this week, Soudal-QuickStep announced that the recently retired Dries Devenyns would remain with the team as a directeur sportif, while Jurgen Foré was revealed as the new COO and as a potential successor to Lefevere in the longer term.
Foré, son of 1963 Tour of Flanders winner Noël, raced as an amateur before focusing on a career in financial services.
“I didn't know Jurgen very well as a rider, although I seem to remember that he drove for Eddy Merckx's youth team. He wasn't bad, but he wasn't quite good enough to break through,” Lefever told Het Nieuwsblad.
Foré has most recently worked as a partner at Deloitte, and Lefevere explained that he first met with the 53-year-old about a role at the team earlier this year, before news had broken of the proposed merger with Jumbo-Visma.
“I told him at the end of our meeting: we will see what the future brings. I was honest with him from day one,” Lefevere said. “I told him there was a lot going on, but I couldn't say anything because I had signed a non-disclosure agreement. I just told him: know that I won’t forget. And then suddenly there was the story of that near-merger. The rest is history.”
