A three-year lifeline
Jean-René Bernaudeau sounded more moved than triumphant. The Vendée team boss told RMC Sport on Tuesday that the relief of finding a new title sponsor was real, after months in which the squad’s future hung on a signature that did not come.
TotalEnergies’ contract ended with the 2026 season. Xefi, a company based in Lyon, will now carry the team for the next three years. Bernaudeau credited its owner, Sacha Rosenthal, for believing in him, and said the story is only starting.
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“I could not give up”
Bernaudeau said stopping was never an option. He pointed to his under-23 Vendée U riders, who delivered an outstanding season, and asked what he would have told the young men about to pull on a Xefi jersey. Several riders had already left over the long wait, but others stayed, among them Mathis Le Berre. Bernaudeau says they trusted him and knew he does not cheat. Had he found no solution, he added, he would have released them from their contracts.
He also pushed back on the idea that riders are finished at 23. Between studies, work and cycling, he argued, nobody can realistically reach the Tour de France at 20. Paul Seixas, in his view, is a stroke of luck for the team but an exception, not a model.
What it means for 2027
The deal keeps a team that has started the Tour de France every year without a miss alive, and it keeps the French pathway Bernaudeau built around Vendée U intact. His promise for next season was short: Xefi will not get a boring team.
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