Richard Carapaz

He made his Grand Tour debut in the Vuelta a España, finishing 36th overall.

Richard Antonio Carapaz Montenegro (born 29 May 1993) is an Ecuadorian professional road racing cyclist who currently rides for UCI WorldTeam.

Carapaz became the first Ecuadorian rider to win a Grand Tour and the second South American rider to win the Giro, after Colombian Nairo Quintana in 2014.

On 28 July 2016, he joined from as a trainee for the remainder of the 2016 season.

He signed as a professional rider ahead of the 2017 season.

In his first full year for the, Carapaz came second in both the GP Industria & Artigianato and the Route du Sud.

His first professional victories came in 2018, with a stage and the overall in the Vuelta a Asturias.

He won stage 8 of the Giro d'Italia, becoming the first Ecuadorian cyclist to win a Grand Tour stage.

He finished in the top ten in five other stages of that race, and finished fourth in the general classification.

He also completed the 2018 Vuelta a España in 18th place.

Carapaz won the 2019 Giro d'Italia, becoming the first Ecuadorian rider to win the race.

In July 2021, he won the gold medal in the road race at the 2020 Summer Olympics, becoming the first Ecuadorian cyclist to win a medal and only the second Ecuadorian in any sport to win a gold medal at the Olympic Games.

In doing so, he became the first cyclist to achieve an Olympic road race gold medal and a podium finish in each of the three Grand Tours.

Carapaz was born in El Carmelo, Tulcán Canton.

Whilst at school, he was mentored by one of his teachers, former Olympic racing cyclist Juan Carlos Rosero, who started a cycling club at the school.

The club has also produced a number of other professional riders, including Jhonatan Narváez and Jonathan Caicedo.

Prior to taking up cycling, Carapaz competed for his school as a runner.

Carapaz began his career with amateur teams in Ecuador, Colombia and Spain.

Carapaz again won the Vuelta a Asturias in 2019, and went on to win the 2019 Giro d'Italia.

After multiple crashes late in stage 4 saw several riders go down and a select group break off on the front, Carapaz made an attack in the final kilometre to take the stage win.

On Stage 13, Carapaz attacked and got clear of the two favourites for overall victory, Vincenzo Nibali and Primož Roglič.

This placed him among the other favourites, two minutes down on Roglič.

On stage 14, Carapaz again attacked and won the stage by almost two minutes, taking the general classification lead.

Carapaz successfully defended his lead for the rest of the race to take the overall victory.

Carapaz joined at the beginning of the 2020 season on a three-year deal.

His first win for the team came on 7 August, on the third stage of the Tour de Pologne: on the uphill drag to the finish, Carapaz made an attack in the final kilometre and held off the peloton.

In the Tour de France, he came second in both stages 16 and 18.

On the latter stage, he finished alongside teammate Michał Kwiatkowski, who won the stage, while Carapaz took the lead in the mountains classification from Tadej Pogačar.

However, two days later, Pogačar retook the lead, and also won the stage and moved into the overall race lead; Carapaz ultimately finished second in the mountains classification.

In the Vuelta a España, Carapaz was once again a challenger for overall victory and traded places with defending champion Primož Roglič several times for the race lead.

He first took the red jersey of the race leader on stage 6 from Roglič.

On stage 10, Carapaz relinquished it back to Roglič, who won the day's stage, though the two were tied on time and had to be differentiated by tiebreakers.

Carapaz regained the race lead briefly after stage 12, but lost it for good to Roglič after the thirteenth stage.

On the mountainous penultimate stage, with Roglič, Carapaz, and Hugh Carthy locked in a three-way battle for the overall victory, Carapaz attacked but only managed to take 15 seconds on Carthy and 21 seconds on Roglič.

In doing so, he secured a second place overall finish.

Carapaz took his first victory of the 2021 season on 10 June, winning the mountainous fifth stage of the Tour de Suisse.

In so doing, he took the general classification lead, which he defended over the remaining five stages to take the overall win by 17 seconds ahead of Rigoberto Urán.

Carapaz was named to the 's Tour de France squad as one of four possible contenders for the general classification alongside Tao Geoghegan Hart, Richie Porte, and Tour winner Geraint Thomas.

After the other three riders were involved in crashes and lost time in the first week, Carapaz emerged as the sole leader.

He would eventually finish third overall.