Alfie George (SCO Dijon-Team Materiel-velo.com), the young Scot from Abernyte, Perthshire, has been making his presence felt in France with a string of impressive performances and this current season has seen Alfie maintain his upward trajectory, last week chalking up another significant victory by taking a fine solo win from the break, at the Tour Cycliste des 4B Sud Charente.
This isn’t a UCI-ranked event, but make no mistake, these French Elite Nationale races are hard, packed with tough riders from top amateur and Continental teams. Winning here isn’t just about raw power it’s also about knowing how to race smart. Held in the rolling roads of Charente, south of Angoulême (the “4B” refers to the four former canton capitals that the race connects; Blanzac, Brossac, Baignes, and Barbezieux), this race provided the perfect parcours for George to add another win to his growing palmarès.
This win, coming just a fortnight after his third place at the Grand Prix de la Ville de Lillers, shows that Alfie is already in cracking form this season, having kicked off the year with third at the Grand Prix d’Onjon, ninth at Le Tour des 100 Communes, and eighth in the Grand Prix de Puyloubier Sainte-Victoire.
We last spoke to Alfie in 2019, when he represented Great Britain at the UCI Road World Championships in Yorkshire, finishing a superb seventh in the Junior Men’s Road Race, and then again shortly after that when paired with Max Rushby, he won the u23 Gent Six Day.
That same season at the National Youth and Junior Track Championships in Newport, Alfie broke the Scottish National Junior Men’s Individual Pursuit record and clinched three national track titles in less than 24 hours at the Geraint Thomas National Velodrome of Wales, as well as finishing fifth in the Junior edition of Paris-Roubaix.
Coming out of the pandemic times, transitioning into the senior ranks and moving to France, Alfie continued to build on his successes. In 2022, he secured a second-place finish at the Grand Prix de la Somme Conseil Départemental 80.
Season’23 marked a significant milestone in Alfie’s career; he achieved his first UCI road race victory by winning a stage at the Tour Cycliste International de la Guadeloupe.
Last year he continued to demonstrate consistency and resilience, finishing second in a stage at the Tour de la Mirabelle and eighth overall at the Ronde de l’Oise.
With last week’s success, we felt it was high time we caught up with Alfie to hear about how this latest win came about and how he’s finding life in France.
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Congratulations Alfie, you’ve had a good run of results lately…
“Yes, thanks, that race win last week was an Elite Nationale event, one of the regular top level races I can do in France.
“A couple of my other good results recently were in UCI 1.2 races, which means they had French Pro-Conti setups and all the World Tour Devo teams there too.
“There are only a couple of French DN1 teams (like my team) that get invited to those.”
One of the 1.2 races was the Grand Prix de la Ville de Lillers, where you were third with Matthew Brennan winning.
“Yeah, it wasn’t a win but getting third behind Matthew was a good result – and now he’s winning World Tour races!
“I’ve had some contacts and some followers on Instagram after these races, some folk are ‘putting out feelers’, so that’s super-exciting.
“If I keep doing what I’m doing, I’m thinking that something will happen by the end of the year.”
Tell us about last week’s win in Tour Cycliste des 4B Sud Charente.
“Basically, the teams really race as teams in these events, so it’s important to have a strong team – but we actually went to this one off our own back; we were doing a race west of where we are here in Dijon, and we did okay.
“The Tour Cycliste des 4B Sud Charente was the next day and another couple of hours further west and we asked the team if we could do it, because the team hadn’t planned it in, they weren’t planning on doing it.
“We said we’ll pay our own accommodation etc. but can we please use the team car? The team said yes, and in the end the mechanic came too.
“So in the race we only had four guys and since we didn’t have enough riders to be able to chase down breaks we decided to get on the front foot; I got in the break from the start, it went after about 10k.
“There was very little collaboration, there were about 20 of us but guys were playing the ‘my leader’s behind’ card, and I’ve been ‘played’ before in these situations, so I told myself to stay calm.
“The group grew and grew as a few of the really good riders bridged across, some of them pretty fast in a sprint. My teammate (and housemate) Antoine Berger made an attack in the cross winds, and Louis Hardouin (who ended up third) followed him, and I jumped on them.
“I looked back and saw we had a bit of a gap so when they both sat up after a bit, I jumped again and was clear on my own, with 10k still to go; technical little roads, a bit of a tailwind, a little two minute climb with about 4k to go…
Radios aren’t allowed in those races, so how did you know whether to push on or not?
“I was getting some times from the motos but really, just looking behind I could see the gap was going out.
“Compared to the flat out riding I’d done earlier, this felt like I was cruising really, and then when I got to the small climb I gave it a good dig.
“I think the last time I won on my own was the Edinburgh Road Club’s “Season Starters” criterium at Ingleston!”
Your teammate Antoine Berger, was second, the team will have been very happy?
“Yes, the team were buzzing after that.
“I’m one of the older riders in the team and I think they were almost expecting me to get some good results this season, to step up and be a leader to the younger guys, and to set an example by winning. So to do it early in the season sets things up nicely.”
Do you feel that pressure to win?
“No, not compared to when I was racing Team Pursuit on the track at the European Championships for example. Then, I really did feel pressure…
“When I’m riding on the road – particularly in the UCI races – there’s really no expectations for me to win so that in itself takes the pressure off.”
Tell us about the SCO Dijon-Team Materiel-velo.com team you’re with.
“The team is a well-established team, they do a really good job looking after us; we’ve got a great calendar, we can race pretty much every week, they give us our bikes and gear, and we get paid a little bit too.
“There’s no team house, three of us share an apartment that we rent ourselves.“But we have a good Service Course, it’s in the Palais de Sport, beside the Dijon basketball team. We have an office there, and a workshop where the mechanic’s based, and there are a number of full-time staff, the DS’s, the Manager, and we have quite a few volunteers too.
“It’s cool, and it’s only two minutes from where I’m living so it’s super-handy.”
Any downsides to where you are?
“The riding around Dijon for training is fantastic, but it’s a big city and you have to watch how you go; like everywhere these days, you ride beside cars in the city, filtering to the front at traffic lights and see that everyone is on their phones!”
You’re still a Rayner Foundation supported rider?
“Yes, for the fourth year now, and that’s been a big help, it’s meant that together with the salary from the team I’m *almost* breaking even!
“I don’t need to stress about my results to be able to pay my way, I can afford the rent, and food, to live here and to race every week.”
How do you get on with your teammates, Brits Ollie Boarer (just out of the Junior category) and Farley Barber, who had some good wins last year?
“Farley is actually in the house with me here. Yes, he won quite a few good criteriums last season – and an Elite Nationale too. He’s super-quick, I’m telling him he should do the National Crit Champs this year.
“And Ollie did well in the Junior races last year; he was 7th in Liege-Bastogne-Liege Juniors, and did well in a big stage race in the Basque Country. He doesn’t live with us, he stays down the road.
“The French amateur races have the reputation of being pretty sketchy, I was saying to Ollie at the start of the season, if you can get top ten in L-B-L these French races should be no problem. He told me he just sat at the back out the way then passed them on the climbs!
“Actually, I think there’s a high degree of respect amongst the French amateurs, you know some of them have work on the Monday, or have a family, maybe kids, and they do respect one another I reckon, maybe even more than the pros do.”
How did the Team Presentation go last Friday?
“It was lovely, meeting all the partners, and the sponsors, having a chat with everyone.
“It’s a good club; they have us lot, the DN1 team, and they also have mountain bikers, juniors, and a youth section.
“They got me up on stage and asked me about the race at the weekend, which was a surprise but really nice. My French is fluent now, so it was no problem.
“I was asked how I celebrated the win (and Antoine’s second place), but it was so late when we got back home that day, like 2am, we just found a pizza place that was open. The glamour!”
You must have worked very hard over the winter?
“Mark Stewart was away in New Zealand and let me stay in his apartment in Girona for the whole winter, and that was a huge help for me, I got a whole winter of warm winter training.
“And I met my girlfriend in Girona while I was there, she was at university in the city, so it was a good time.”
“I think Mark’s a resident in Andorra now, and in March is got a lot of snow, so I’m not sure how that was for training…”
“I love staying at my girlfriend’s place on the coast, outside Girona though, I love the training there, and her family have been incredible with me; they’d never so much as seen a bike race before, then I turn up with my bike, and now they drive seven hours up to France on so many weekends to support me, and they’ve got big signs with ‘Alfie’ on them!”
You didn’t race much in 2020 due to Covid? How did you stay sane and fit during the lockdowns?
“At that point I was on the u23 Academy with GB, I went down in October 2019. Back then they tried to break riders with a ‘boot camp’ style of regime, which was interesting; riding through the snow to get to the track, doing ‘triple days’, riding track league and riding home in the dark at half past nine at night on the A34…
“We were taken off to race in Belgium and I got 20th in my first race, which was a decent start, and I thought ‘great, here we go’, then Covid happened and we all got sent home.
“It was sunny a lot of the time, and I did most of my riding on my own. I was getting paid a salary all the way through, which never stopped, so that was good. What wasn’t so good was that my parents are both doctors and they were working on the front line throughout that time.
“At the end of 2020 we went back down to Manchester. I was keen to do the track and the road, and after my 7th place at the Worlds I had some invitations from World Tour Devo teams, but I was told that if I left the Academy to join one of them I’d never ride for GB again (so no Tour de l’Avenir, or Nations Cups, etc.) .
Looking for race results, it seems you didn’t get to race much with the BC Academy in 2021?
“Because we were the National Team we couldn’t sneak over the border to race, the government didn’t let the team travel to race.
“By the time April came around, I was so overtrained and there were issues with the coach. Most of the Academy riders were going really badly because the training wasn’t working for us. Then we were getting fewer opportunities on the road as they brought back in the guys who they’d told ‘you’ll never ride for GB again’!
“I did make it into the Tour of Britain team but then failed a mandatory Covid test before the start (which later turned out to be a false positive). The race was going up Cairn o’Mount that year and I’d planned for the fan club (well, family and friends) to be there with the banners too!
“Later on that season, it came down to a choice between riding the Tour de l’Avenir and riding the European Track Championships. I was told that if I rode l’Avenir I’d’ be kicked off the squad at the end of the year, so I rode the Euros on the track.
“And I was still kicked off the squad at the end of the year.”
After leaving the Academy you took yourself off to France?
“I saw what Mark Stewart had done and the path he’d taken, and I wanted to do the same, but in my attempts at not burning my bridges I maybe stalled a bit. Mark’s a brilliant mentor to me and he was kicked off the squad in lockdown, about six months before I was, so I rang him up to ask for some advice.
“He helped me to realise that my self-worth isn’t tied to my ability or results on the bike. I wouldn’t have had the guts to leave the squad voluntarily, because it was my dream after all, but when I was kicked off, I found it was actually a massive relief.
“I struggled to actually ‘ask for help’ but in the end I realised I needed to. My friends Lewis Askey and Archie Ryan both have the same agent and he had a rider with TotalEnergies at that time, so he called them up and got me a place with their Devo team, Vendée U.
“I loved my time in that team, they were a great bunch of guys, with some crazy ideas, but I loved the scene, there are so many fans in the west and it re-ignited my my love for the bike again.”
You switched from Vendée U Pays de la Loire to SCO Dijon-Team Materiel-velo.com, why?
“I got on really well with the big boss there, Jean-Renee Bernadeau [fifth in the 1979 Tour de France, ed.], and I think he liked my attitude and so on, but I was coming out of my last year of U23 and the team were wanting to concentrate their resources on that category, on the development of younger riders, so I was asked to leave the team, which was a disappointment, for sure.
“That was the second time I’d wanted to stay somewhere and been kicked off.
“I rang around every single team in France and it was Guillaume Souyris, who’s my DS now, who I had a great chat with and gave me really good vibes. I knew I was going to ride for Dijon there and then. And I’ve really landed on my feet here.”
Has Brexit proven to be a problem (visas, the 90 days in 180 rule, etc.)?
“Absolutely. It was an absolute nightmare. I’ve managed to get my visa every year, and I now have my residency too, which helps greatly, but to get to this point was painful.
“When I was applying for my first sports visa, the one the system recommended was categorised as ‘Person of International Talent or Reputation’.
“I filled in and submitted the form and provided all the evidence needed, and went along to this company in Edinburgh that you have to use (they apply on your behalf to the French embassy). They said ‘nope, you’re not talented enough’.
“I asked them ‘what do you mean?’, and they told me that when they say ‘talent’, they mean ‘talent, like Andy Murray or Lady Gaga’!
“I badgered the chap into sending my visa application in anyway, despite his reservations, and it did get approved.
“I received my visa the day before I flew to France just before my first race.”
What are the targets for this season?
“It’s simply to sign a Pro contract this year.”
“We’ve got the chance here to ride a number of very good UCI Class 2 races, and for me that’s all I’m focusing on, getting more wins which will get me noticed by a Pro team.
So what’s the next for you, Alfie?
“Well, ccoming up in April, I’ve got the Boucle de l’Artois, which is a Class 2 one day, 1.2 race and a good one to do well in – if you get a win there you know there’s going to be teams contacting you after that.
“Then I’ve got the Tour du Loir et Cher, which is a five day stage race, part of the Europe Tour, and again you’ve got guys who do well there going on to the top level. [Interestingly, Callum MacLeod was second a couple of years ago, Russell Downing was third in 2016, and Graeme Briggs won it a couple of years before that. ed.]
“And then I’m coming back to ride the Cicle Classic for the Scotland team on the 27th, so April is a huge month for me, and every race is an opportunity to try and perform.
“My objective at the start of this season was to come into this April block with good form, and the way the races are there’s so much that can happen.
“It’s almost a negative to put a lot of emphasis on one specific race because if that goes wrong for whatever reason, it can be hard to get over.
“If I can pick up one or two more good results this April, that’ll stand me in really good stead. At the moment I’m feeling like I can’t put a foot wrong but I’m aware that it won’t go like that for the whole season.”
Are you planning to take your foot off the gas a bit then come back up to form for your main targets?
“That’s the idea, yes. I’ll plan in four or five days off, otherwise there’s a risk of burnout.
“When I first came to France and found that you can race every single weekend, I was so keen, I loved it and wanted to do that, and I was battered by the summertime.
“I now know the way to do it is to train at less than ‘full bloc’, just ticking along, then race at the weekend, then recover. Mark Stewart is still advising me about my training and he’s the one that emphasises to me about taking days off.
“So in May I’ll back off then start another big block that’ll finish probably for the National Championships, which are the same time as the French Nationals so there’s a bit of a pause in the season for everyone.”
What’s your thoughts about the recent announcement: the Tour de France starting in Edinburgh in ’27?
“And the Grand Départ next year is in Barcelona, so I basically have the next two years of ‘home’ Grand Départs, so I better get my arse into gear and get that pro contract!
“Obviously, Edinburgh in two years time is extra motivation for me and I’d love to be there – but first I have to get that pro contract and prove that I can do the job.
Guys like Sean Flynn and Oscar Onley, they’ve worked hard to be where they are, of course, but I look at Sean, we’ve always been the same level growing up and he’s a good friend of mine. He’s competing in the monuments now, he was with Tudor, he worked hard and he got those results… it makes me feel it’s all possible.
With thanks to Alfie for his generosity of time and information, and wishing him all the best for the rest of the season.
