Nicolas Roche

Nicolas Roche
	Nicolas Roche (2015)
To person
Date of birth	3rd July 1984
nation	Ireland
discipline	Street
To the team
Current team	Sunweb
function	driver
Most important successes
	two stages Vuelta a España
	Last updated: February 1, 2017

Nicolas Roche (2013)

Roche before the start of Liège – Bastogne – Liège 2008

Nicolas Roche (born July 3, 1984 in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine , France ) is an Irish cyclist .

Family and nationality

Nicolas Roche, whose mother is French and whose father is the former road bike world champion and Tour-de-France and Giro d'Italia winner Stephen Roche , was born in France and thus had both Irish and French citizenship. After he had previously exercised his right to vote according to the rules of the World Cycling Federation UCI to ride with a French license, in 2005 he had to choose one of the two nationalities due to new French legislation : he initially chose the French, but subsequently started with Irish license.

Career

Juniors

Nicolas Roche already had some successes in the juniors; In 2002, when he started for the French team OCCV Draguignan, he won the overall ranking and two stages of the Tour of Ireland (Juniors).

U23

During his time in the U23 age group, which he played mainly in the service of the well-known and successful French team VC La Pomme Marseille , Roche was again able to attract attention with good results. Not least his second place in the overall ranking of the Tour du Loir-et-Cher and his third place in the Irish road race championship in 2004 brought him a place in the French team Cofidis as a stagiaire from September 1st of the same year .

professional

Roche started his first season as a professional in 2005 for Cofidis as one of the youngest drivers in the UCI ProTour . A year later, the first successes came with a fourth place in the overall standings in the Paris – Corrèze stage race and winning a stage in the Tour de l'Avenir , which he was also able to finish fourth in the overall standings.

In 2006 he switched to Crédit Agricole , for which he was Irish time trial champion in 2007. In 2008 Nicolas Roche won stages at the Grand Prix Paredes Rota dos Móveis and the Tour du Limousin .

For the 2009 season, Nicolas Roche moved to the French team ag2r-La Mondiale , for which he drove until 2012. In addition to victories at the Irish road championship in 2009 and a stage win at the Tour of Beijing 2011, he developed into a solid rider for three-week tours and was able to achieve sixth overall at the Vuelta a España 2010 and twelfth at the 2012 Tour de France place.

After four years at ag2R, Roche moved to Team Saxo-Tinkoff in 2013 . He won a stage at the Vuelta a España in 2013 and finished fifth overall.

For the 2015 season he moved to Team Sky from Great Britain. At the Tour de France 2015 he was one of the helpers of the eventual winner Chris Froome and was 35 overall in the end. After two years he switched to the BMC Racing Team and in 2019 to the Sunweb team .