August 31, 2023 - (Montréal, Que.) Once again this year, the Grands Prix Cyclistes de Québec et de Montréal (GPCQM) will feature an outstanding slate of riders with, among others, 6 of the top 10 finishers from the most recent Tour de France lining up at the start on September 8 and 10. It will be a top-flight peloton but also one of considerable depth, since in addition to the 18 UCI WorldTeams, the organizers have invited 4 ProTeams along with Team Canada as wild-card entries, for a total of 23 teams and 161 racers from 26 countries on 5 continents—the biggest field since the inception of the GPCQM in 2010.
Those five squads, Israel–Premier Tech, led by Canadians Hugo Houle, Michael Woods, Guillaume Boivin and Derek Gee, Lotto DSTNY, with Arnaud De Lie, the rising star of Belgian cycling, Tudor Pro Cycling Team, managed by former rider Fabian Cancellara, Team Novo Nordisk, made up exclusively of riders with diabetes, and Team Canada, will have no qualms about tackling the 201.6 km course in Québec City (16 laps of a 12.6 km circuit including the punishing Côte de la Montagne) and the 221.4 km race in Montréal (18 laps around a 12.3 km loop, with a total of nearly 5,000 metres of climbing).
The competition will be at the very highest level again this year, with 9 stage winners from this year’s Tour de France vying for the podium. The headliners include:
JULIAN ALAPHILIPPE (France) (Soudal Quick-Step), the UCI Road World Champion in 2020 and 2021;
ADAM YATES (Great Britain) (UAE Team Emirates), third-place finisher and winner of a stage at the 2023 Tour de France;
GREG VAN AVERMAET (Belgium) (AG2R Citroën Team), Gold Medalist in the Men’s Road Race at the 2016 Olympics, four-time podium finisher at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal including wins in 2016 and 2019, six-time podium finisher in Québec City and a participant in ten consecutive GPCQMs, competing in his final season as a professional;
BENOÎT COSNEFROY (France) (AG2R Citroën Team), winner of the 2022 Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec;
SIMON YATES (Great Britain) (Team Jayco–AlUla), the fourth-place finisher at the 2023 Tour de France and a winner of ten Grand Tour stages;
MICHAEL MATTHEWS (Australia) (Team Jayco–AlUla), winner of the 2018 and 2019 Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec and of the 2018 Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal, and a Tour de France stage winner in 2022;
MICHAEL WOODS (Canada) (Israel–Premier Tech), winner of Stage 9 at this year’s Tour de France, the third Canadian in history to win a stage at the Grande Boucle.
The field will also include riders of the calibre of Christophe Laporte (France) (Team Jumbo–Visma), winner of Gent– Wevelgem and Across Flanders in 2023, Diego Ulissi (Italy) (UAE Team Emirates), who won the 2017 GP de Montréal, Michal Kwiatkowski (Poland) (Ineos Grenadiers), the 2014 UCI Road World Champion, Biniam Girmay (Eritrea) (Intermarché–Circus–Wanty), the first African winner of a Classic race on the UCI WorldTour (Gent– Wevelgem in 2022) and 3rd in the 2022 GP de Québec, David Gaudu (France) (Groupama FDJ), 4th in the 2022 Tour de France, Jai Hindley (Australia) (Bora–Hansgrohe), who won a stage and spent a day in the Yellow Jersey at the 2023 Tour de France, Victor Lafay (France) (Cofidis), also a stage winner at this year’s Tour, Warren Barguil (France) (Arkéa–Samsic) and many more, eagerly awaited on home turf by Hugo Houle (Israel–Premier Tech), the first Quebecer to win a stage at the Tour de France, his teammate Guillaume Boivin, and the rest of the large contingent of Canadians lining up at the start.
“We are pleased and proud to be hosting such a high-level field of competitors once again in 2023, including proven champions who perform at their very best for us every year,” said Sébastien Arsenault, CEO of the GPCQM. “Since 2010, our events have delivered spectacular athleticism and excitement, and Tadej Pogačar’s and Benoît Cosnefroy’s victories last year were the ultimate reward for us. Thanks to the hard work of our teams and the confidence of our public- and private-sector partners, over the years we have built up the reputation of our races—the only UCI WorldTour events in the Americas—to the point where they are acclaimed as being among the very best on the planet. The prospect of hosting the UCI Road World Championships in 2026 further fuels our ambition and determination to stage outstanding, world-class cycling events,” he concluded.
On Saturday, September 9, on the GP de Montréal site, just prior to the traditional Critérium National de Montréal, the GPCQM organizing committee, which is also tasked with organizing the 2026 UCI Road World Championships, will take advantage of the presence of the biggest teams in the international pro peloton to symbolically launch this prestigious event during which cycling will rule on the Avenue du Parc site in three years’ time. The event will be attended by representatives of the ublic-sector partners—the City of Montréal, the governments of Québec and Canada, and Tourisme Montréal—along with athletes, media and global cycling stakeholders.
ABOUT THE GPCQM
The Grands Prix Cyclistes de Québec et de Montréal, the only UCI WorldTour events held in the Americas, contribute significantly to the achievement of one of the International Cycling Union’s (UCI) priority objectives: the globalization of the WorldTour circuit. These events join those already certified in Europe, Asia and Oceania. Since 2010, the organizers have been responsible for the planning and staging of the GPCQM and rely on the indispensable support of public and private partners: the Government of Canada, the Government of Québec, the City of Québec, the City of Montréal, the National Battlefields Commission, the Québec City Tourism Office, Tourisme Montréal, Québecor and TVA Sports as the official broadcaster of the races
