HAS PROTEST WON?

Israel-Premier Tech's name change can't erase cycling's political fault lines, writes Chris Marshall-Bell, as the threat of protest looms over next year's Tour de France

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The protesters at the Vuelta a España, many thousand in number, demanded that Israel-Premier Tech (IPT) be shut down. The team, as owner Sylvan Adams put it, refused to cower, and the UCI, cycling's governing body, rushed to their defence. Yet the unstoppable force of a protest movement that has swelled across the world has finally shifted the immovable object: Israel-Premier Tech will not exist, at least not under that name, in 2026.

A fragile ceasefire is now in place in Gaza, but does the pause in hostilities – and IPT's forced rebrand – signal the end of one of cycling's most fraught tangles with geopolitics? Or does it mark a new era in which protest and public pressure exert greater influence on cycling, blurring the line between politics and sport as never before?

Peloton politics

IPT is an Israel-registered team that is privately funded, chiefly by Israeli-Canadian billionaire Sylvan Adams, who is overtly supportive of the current Israeli government. Protests against IPT at races, which began in 2023 with a scattering of flags and banners, grew in scale as Gaza's humanitarian crisis deepened during 2025, ultimately forcing the cancellation of the final stage of the Vuelta a España. Riders on rival teams pleaded for the team to suspend its racing activities, fearing for the safety of riders. In private group messages seen by Cycling Weekly, one prominent rider from a rival team said: “The fact they are racing under the name of a country committing genocide means that politics and sport are very much already intertwined... protesters have nothing to protest if Israel is not participating in sportswashing here.”