Richard Carapaz

Carapaz grew up in El Carmelo, a farming village in Carchi province on Ecuador's northern border, and came to cycling through a school club run by his teacher Juan Carlos Rosero, a former Olympic rider. The same club produced Jhonatan Narváez and Jonathan Caicedo. He raced as an amateur in Ecuador, Colombia and Spain, joining Lizarte in 2016 before Movistar signed him as a stagiaire that July.

At Movistar he won stage 8 of the 2018 Giro d'Italia, the first Ecuadorian to take a Grand Tour stage, and finished fourth overall. He came back in 2019 as the junior option behind Mikel Landa, won stage 4 into Frascati, then attacked on the road to Courmayeur on stage 14 and took the maglia rosa. He held it to Milan ahead of Vincenzo Nibali and Primož Roglič.

He moved to Ineos in 2020 and traded the red jersey with Roglič at that autumn's Vuelta a España before finishing second. In 2021 he won the Olympic road race in Tokyo, over a minute clear of the chase, and was third at the Tour de France. He led the 2022 Giro deep into the third week before losing it to Jai Hindley, then won three stages and the mountains jersey at the Vuelta.

A crash on the opening stage in Bilbao ended his 2023 Tour de France, his first season at EF Education-EasyPost. In 2024 he took the yellow jersey after stage 3, the first Ecuadorian to lead the race, and lost it back to Tadej Pogačar the next day. He won stage 17 by 37 seconds from Simon Yates, finished the Tour in the polka dot jersey, and was fourth overall at the Vuelta.

At the 2025 Giro he won stage 11 into Castelnovo ne' Monti and took third overall, having spent stage 20 marking Isaac del Toro on the Colle delle Finestre while Yates rode clear to the win. Gastroenteritis forced him out of the Tour de France that July.

His racing leans on repeated short accelerations rather than steady tempo, and on committing early: the Courmayeur move in 2019 and the stage 17 breakaway in 2024 both came from a long way out. He gives up time against the clock, which has shaped the way he takes on three-week races.