Tour de France Femmes stage winner and one of the biggest prospects in the peloton, Cédrine Kerbaol will race for EF-Oatly-Cannondale from 2025. The 23-year-old French all-rounder is hoping to build on her best season yet and is clearly eager to race in pink.
“This team was something I was always interested in,” said Cédrine of her decision to sign with the squad. “There are a lot of strong riders here so I’m coming with expectations of doing big things with the team.”
A former U23 and elite French national time trial champion, Cédrine excels on a variety of terrains. In 2023, she earned a silver medal at the U23 individual time trial world championships and was the best young rider at the Tour de France Femmes. During the 2024 season, she added to her already impressive palmarès by winning the Vuelta CV Feminas, Durango-Durango, stage six of the Tour de France Femmes, Chrono Roland Bouge, before closing out her season with a solo victory at Tre Valli Varesine.
“Long, solitary efforts like a time trial or a breakaway are my main strength on the bike. That’s how I like to race. I’m a strong climber and, something I wouldn’t necessarily have said in the past, a strong descender too,” Cédrine said, referring to the downhill masterclass she executed to win a Tour de France Femmes stage this summer. “I try to be balanced. I try to be a bit of everything!”
As the first French woman to win a stage of the Tour de France Femmes, a true moment of national pride, Cédrine has her sights set on her country’s grand tour.
“I love the Tour de France Femmes and next year the second stage starts in my hometown. I was born in Brest so that’s a really, really big target I’m looking forward to,” she admitted.
With each season more successful than her last, Cédrine in fact credits much of her success to the lessons she’s learned from the times she has come up short and not met her own expectations or goals.
“There are always good things to learn from every situation,” she said. “Of course, when you win a race, you see that things can work a certain way, but when you lose there is plenty to learn. What can I do better next time? What mistakes do I need to not make again? That’s how you learn so much about yourself and about who you are. I find that in this sport, you learn a lot about psychology.”
For Cédrine, cycling is just as much about putting in the hours on the bike as it is about being mentally prepared and knowing herself. Her inner maturity is evident in this respect.
“Racing is a physical challenge but also a mental challenge and I really enjoy this. My dreams are what motivate me. I like to keep my dreams to myself, but I want to be the best rider I can be so I am always looking for the best way to get there and, of course, to also have fun,” Cédrine said.
The combination of growth and fun is precisely why signing with EF-Oatly-Cannondale appealed to Cédrine.
“The mood of the team is both familial, but also professional. It’s important to me that I feel very comfortable in a team and with EF-Oatly-Cannondale, I really think I’m going to feel at home and, of course, we’ll have fun! I’ll be back with Nina Berton who signed with the team earlier. She’s a really good teammate and a really good friend also. I’m excited about this but, honestly, I’m excited about everything for next season.”
EF-Oatly-Cannondale general manager Esra Tromp is equally excited to have Cédrine join the squad.
“Cédrine is a rider that fits with the DNA of the team. Her style of riding is exactly how we want to race. It’s exciting to watch how she will risk losing in order to give her all for a result. She is an impressive rider and still quite young. We both have big ambitions and I am confident that we will grow and achieve together. Cédrine’s strength and versatility make her the ideal rider to complete our 2025 roster,” Esra said.
Off the bike, Cédrine is passionate about science and nature. She has a degree in nutritional science and loves to read about science in general. When she has time at home in Brittany, she’ll often drive her van to the mountains to hike and ride.
It was her love of the outdoors and her energetic disposition that ultimately led her to cycling. Growing up in Brest, she took up surfing and dabbled in triathlon before she joined the local cycling club at age 14. Cédrine started out mountain biking and switched to the road within a year or two.
“Being outside is what I love about cycling and that it’s very, very hard,” she said. “I started cycling because I needed to put my energy somewhere and that’s still the case. This is a proper hard sport and I like to suffer!”
She may be prepared to suffer to win, but it is also certain that Cédrine will have a lot of fun along the way too, as she embarks on this next chapter of her career with her new teammates.
