'We can motivate each other with wins' – Groenewegen relishing internal competition with Ewan

Dylan Groenewegen will still be the headline sprinter at Jayco-AlUla in 2024 with a seventh Tour de France appearance lined up, despite Caleb Ewan rejoining from Lotto Dstny. The pair will ride split calendars to avoid any butting of heads, with the Australian set to race the Giro and Vuelta. 

Caleb Ewan’s season has got off to a rocky start with illness hampering his sprinting opportunities at the Tour Down Under after claiming the national criterium title, whereas Groenewegen perfectly opened his 2024 account with a win at the Clàssica Comunitat Valenciana on Saturday.

"I think it’s really good we have totally different programmes," said Groenewegen to Cyclingnews from Jayco AlUla’s training camp. 

"Now he [Ewan] is doing the Australian races, then he goes to the Giro so we never see each other. Hopefully, we can motivate each other with a lot of wins and put the pressure a little bit on."

While this year's Tour was confirmed by Jayco AlUla team manager Brent Copeland as one for Groenewegen, 2025 is still up for grabs and down to which of the two performs better.

Groenewegen missed out on a stage win at the Tour de France in 2023 for the first time since his debut at the race in 2016, prompting the Dutch sprinter to change his plan of attack in terms of this season’s scheduling.

"I think last year I did a lot of races before the Tour and maybe I lost a bit of speed in that in that month, the most important month before the Tour," said Groenewegen.

In 2022, racing at the Critérium du Dauphiné and Tour of Slovenia preceded him taking his last victory at the French Grand Tour on stage 3 in Denmark. But Jayco-AlUla will opt for a less intense programme in May and June after Groenewegen could only manage two top-three finishes last season.

"One year before we got a victory, so that was why I did Dauphiné to get to be a bit harder also on the climbs," said Groenewegen.

"This year, we will skip to Dauphiné to get to just have speed in a left for the sprints in the Tour."

The Dutchman will see leadership at the Tour de France in a roster half focused on his sprints and the other on Simon Yates' GC challenge. Groenewegen had no qualms with the dual focus, especially with it becoming the general trend in the peloton.

"A lot of teams now choose a sprinter and a climber. We do it and this year at the Tour in the summer it's a big goal for this team to go for GC as well as the sprints," he said. "We'll split the team 50% for Yates and 50% for me."

Improved sprint train with Matthews

The whole Tour de France sprint field was at the mercy of Jasper Philipsen during the last edition, with the Alpecin-Deceuninck sprinter taking four wins from the opening four flat sprints with expert lead-outs from Mathieu van der Poel and Jonas Rickaert.

Jayco-AlUla could have a bolstered leadout at the Tour de France in 2024 with Michael Matthews possibly coming in to add his qualities to the core pairing of Elmar Reinders and last-man Luka Mezgec come July, dependent on the Australian all-rounder's Classics season.

"For sure it will be Luka Mezgec as a lead out then we have Elmar Reinders and also Michael Matthews, so I think we have a really strong train," said Groenewegen to Cyclingnews.

"We'll do some races together also with Matthews in the train so it's good to get to know each other for the big race in the summer and that's the Tour de France. That's the big goal."

Matthews and Groenewegen rode the 2022 Tour together where Groenewegen took his last victory at La Grand Boucle, but Matthews didn't lead him out. On that third stage, it was down to the Dutchman's ability to stay towards the front of the peloton and surf the wheels of other teams that he could outsprint Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) to victory by a few centimetres.

Mezgec will retain his position as final pilot and the pair have worked well for the two years since Groenewegen joined the Australian team. They came narrowly close to dethroning Philipsen at the Tour on stage 11, but Mezgec ran out of steam and Groenewegen was forced to latch onto a tiring Uno-X leadout.

Philipsen would come around him in the final hundred metres for his fourth stage win with the Dutchman settling for a frustrating second. However, Matthews' presence in between Reinders and Mezgec could give the Slovenian the chance to survive a few hundred metres further, allowing Groenewegen to launch into the wind later and compete with Philipsen.

Groenewegen and Matthews kicked off their 2024 seasons in fine fashion with victories in Spain, and the pair will be focusing on their own plans should they come together in France.

"We don't need to look all the time to Alpecin or to the other teams, just do our plan and hopefully it gives us the results that we that we want," said Groenewegen.

The Dutch sprinter did note how recent parcours of the Tour have been differing from seven years ago, with more stages suited to puncheurs taking the place of formerly flat opening weeks.

"It's not changing totally different. But when I did my first Tour de France, especially the first week, you had a lot of flat stages and now it's more like maybe two chances," he said. "It's not like back in the day, It's more hilly also from the start."

The 2024 route will have the sprinters stinging in the legs by day three for their first sprint opportunity after a difficult start in Italy with three possible chances for a bunch finish arriving on stages three, five and six.

Following that, there could be around four more opportunities depending on how the route is raced, with no sprinter's royale into Paris as there has been for many years on the Champs Elysées with stage 21 instead arriving into Nice with a time trial due to the Paris Olympic Games. 

Groenewegen will next be in action at the AlUla Tour before he heads to Belgium for a block of racing in the Classics at Bredene-Koksijde, Gent-Wevelgem, Scheldeprijs and Brugge-De Panne.