As Ide Schelling rolls through the finishing gantry in Arnhem at the end of the five-day inaugural Tour of Holland, he wishes his fellow riders well for the off-season. Many of them are his Dutch compatriots and looking forward to a break from the cut-and-thrust of the peloton, before embarking on the winter training that will ultimately deliver them to the first races of 2026 in shape.
For XDS-Astana rider Schelling, there is something deeper in those goodbyes – far more finite. At just 27, he just retired from cycle racing.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
So what is happening in cycling – or perhaps in riders – that is causing what appears to be a glut of young professionals cutting short their tenure in the sport?
We spoke to clinical psychologist and organisational consultant Dr Steve Mayers, who is a keen cyclist himself. There could be a number of things at play, he says.
“I think about it from two perspectives,” he says. “One is whether the sport has changed. And two, has what riders expect changed?
“Maybe it could be both,” he adds. “As an example, it seems like the sport is increasingly intense and demanding on the athletes, and the risks aren’t going down, they’re going up, if anything.”
Rather alarmingly, he adds: “I know that some of the young people that I worked with who’ve been out in France, they were saying, they’re running out of ambulances. It’s too dangerous.”
Mayers also gives the example of the final performance percentage points being sought in every last nook and cranny – marginal gains and the monitoring of training and lifestyle parameters to an increasing degree.
“Maybe it’s just become something that has less enjoyment and is more about how you go out and perform to the numbers. And some people will really adapt to that,” Mayers says. “But in the past, I imagine some will have stayed in cycling because of the love of being on the bike. But if that’s less possible, if you’re professional, that could be pretty rough.”
Early pressure
Not only is gaining form becoming an increasingly scientific process, riders are feeling the pressure to reach that form far younger than ever before. Once Tadej Pogačar and Remco Evenepoel had shown it can be done, the floodgates were open. Now teams and riders start looking for major returns straight out of the gates. Unsurprisingly, this does not help ease the mental pressure, says Mayers.
Tadej Pogačar on the verge of winning his second Tour de France, aged 22
(Image credit: Getty Images)
“It used to be that in your first two or three Grand Tours there were zero expectations, and the team would maybe have a longer term view of the rider’s development,” Mayers says. “Whereas now there’s so many strong people who can evidence through their power numbers that they’re physiologically capable – it’s a really tough, tough market.”
He adds: “I’ve worked with some of them who’ve been in that position where they’re like, ‘I’ve done what the team’s asked me, I haven’t gotten results, and now they want to let me go’. It makes it really hard for people to prove their worth or value. I guess it takes a toll on some people and then they opt out of it, because I imagine that the meaning goes.”
Just as the causes of burnout can come in a variety of forms, so can its symptoms, Mayers explains. There are three key components, he said: a persistent sense of emotional and physical exhaustion, a reduced feeling of accomplishment and creeping sense of detachment.
“In cycling it could be that loads of things happen when somebody’s burnt out,” he adds. “It might not be a homogenous thing, you know, the performance might dip. They might not have joy or motivation, sleep, their mood, they’re irritable. They feel like they don’t want to get on the bike anymore. It could be any of that stuff.”
While feelings of burnout may be nothing new, being able to label them as such without judgement, and then make that decision to leave the sport, could well be part of something more recent, Mayers says.
“My sense is that nowadays, with changes in the way that information is available and access to information and social comparison – a lot of young people that I work with are so aware of the different ways that their life could be. I wonder if some of the younger riders who are thinking ‘this isn’t for me’, it’s partly because they might be seeing friends around them, but now more than ever, they’ll have access to other ways that people are living their lives.
He adds: “And maybe they are feeling it just isn’t worth it. And maybe they sense there’s way more options for them now than there was before, and that could purely just be because of awareness rather than reality.”
Mental health support
Awareness may have dramatically increased, but according to Mayers, the levels of mental health support offered by teams has yet to catch up in a lot of cases.
“The athletes I’ve worked with are mostly a tier below WorldTour but also on WorldTour,” he says. “I think that maybe if the level of support matched the level of awareness, then what you would see is less people burning out, because although people are now aware when things are becoming too much, they wouldn’t necessarily get to that stage if they were supported well during [that time].
“The people I’ve worked with, they’ve all self-funded their therapy, and there’s no reimbursement,” he adds.
Mayers does concede that this is not the situation across board though, with many WorldTour teams offering support.
The issue lies not just with teams, says Mayers. It can be the riders too. Those he works with have often dialled in every other aspect of their cycling existence, from equipment to training to nutrition – but mental health may not even have been thought of.
Enjoying good relationships in and out of the sport can be a great performance aid, says Mayers
(Image credit: Getty Images)
“Whenever that comes last, it sets a precedent,” he says. “It’s not that it has to be first, but it has to be integral to an athlete’s development. It should be ‘person first, athlete second’. So, where are you at? How’s your life, how are your relationships? Your relationships are one of the best performing enhancing aids that we have,” he reveals.
“If people are able to be present more, that’s also good from a performance perspective. There’s all these factors that not only impact wellbeing and burnout, but also impact performance and people’s capability to do well in their job.”
When it comes to burnout – as with most things – it seems prevention is better than a cure. By the time you’re looking at the latter, it’s often too late, as our early retirees have shown. Teams, it would seem, and also riders, need to start planning for future mental resilience early on. Perhaps this year’s exodus from young riders with so much future potential will help teams begin to offer more of the support that appears to be very much needed.
