Elisa Longo Borghini has become synonymous with the colours of both Trek-Segafredo and Lidl-Trek. The Italian rider, as she admits, “grew up” as part of the American squad, first joining them in 2019 and securing her biggest results wearing their jersey. The Paris-Roubaix win, the overall title at the Giro d’Italia, the second Tour of Flanders and Trofeo Binda victories were all secured as part of the outfit she has called home for the last five years – her story with Trek could have been lifted out of a fairytale.
However, that chapter for Longo Borghini – to the surprise of many – is coming to an end. At the start of 2025, the 32-year-old will officially become part of UAE Team ADQ – a Women’s WorldTour team that was established under its current guise just two years ago, based out of the United Arab Emirates. Given Longo Borghini’s profile as a rider and the relatively small status of UAE Team ADQ compared to some of the powerhouse squads in the women’s peloton, it’s not a transfer that most people expected, but as Longo Borghini tells me, there are tangible reasons for her making the move.
“I'm pretty sure that most people would say ‘she's gone there for money’ which is not true,” Longo Borghini asserts. “But I let them talk, because it's always nice when people are talking, and you can laugh because it’s not correct. To be fair, if I had to choose between Lidl-Trek and UAE only for the money, I would have stayed [at Lidl-Trek]. But for me, it's a young team, it's a rising team, they are ambitious, and they meet my character. It’s a different mentality compared to western countries, but it's also a country that wants to grow and the women's community to have a wealthier and healthier style of life. I really like the idea of helping women to embrace the sport and to get more involved in sports in general.”
It’s true that Longo Borghini is a rider who has never shied away from a challenge. Her biggest wins have come in testing conditions – she took victory at the Tour of Flanders at the start of this season after crashing early on a wet corner and fighting back to the peloton through rain and mud. Her Giro d’Italia pink jersey came after a long and arduous battle with SD Worx-Protime’s Lotte Kopecky, leading to a final stage where the pair were separated by just one second.
“I like challenges and this is a challenge that I want to take on into my career. I think, to be honest, this will probably be the last four years of my career, because we are humans, we can't be bike racers forever,” she continues, explaining the choice behind her new contract. “I wanted to have an extra life and personal experience in my career and that was the main thing. I'm sad to leave a place that basically grew me into the rider I am and where I always felt home. But there were some reasons why I needed to go, and one of these was the fact that I wanted a new experience in a new environment.”
There is no doubt that Longo Borghini would have had a huge number of offers when it came to which team to transfer to at the end of this season. Her run of form has been breathtaking – as well as the Flanders and Giro wins, she was on podium in two of the Ardennes Classics, Strade Bianche and Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and finished with a bronze medal at the World Championships.
“I think I had a very chaotic 2023 and after I had Covid I then had a series of infections. The only thing I could do was really stop and rest. That was key to my success in 2024, stopping and letting my body heal then building up slowly,” Longo Borghini says. “All season long, I really felt fine and good in my body. I felt myself again. I was not chasing form. Of course, I had periods where I was a little bit more tired, especially after Vuelta, but overall I felt like my real Elisa, which in 2023 was not there, so I was pretty happy about it.”
She remembers an altitude camp with Lidl-Trek at the start of the year which she began just a few days after coming third at Nieuwsblad. The power numbers she was able to produce then gave Longo Borghini a clear sign that 2024 was going to be a successful year, beginning with the Ronde van Vlaanderen (a race she’d won almost a decade before in 2015 as well).
“Winning Flanders, it was really like a pinnacle of the season. I have to say, the entire week when we were in the hotel waiting for Flanders, there was this strange atmosphere where everybody was not really saying that we were committed 100% for Flanders, but we all knew that we really wanted to win it,” Longo Borghini remembers. “It was just a nice feeling going into that race. I remember Lizzie [Deignan] saying just before the start that she had a good feeling for both me and Shirin van Anrooij in the race. It sounds weird but deep inside me and deep inside everyone, we knew we would have a nice race.”
Longo Borghini says that she felt this same intrinsic belief when she started the Giro d’Italia a few months after the Classics. The pressure was on her to win her home Grand Tour – a victory she has been chasing for her whole career – yet she explains she barely felt it. Instead, there was a calm belief that she was going to be able to achieve her dream. While she is rarely an emotional person, the Longo Borghini's feelings were clear when she pulled on the maglia rosa for the first time at the Giro.
“In all these years, I've never won a Grand Tour so it was a very emotional week and also a thrilling one. Lotte and I were divided by only one second going into the final stage so I had to focus to keep pink,” she explains. “Before the last stage, where everybody was saying that I was going to lose because Kopecky was the best, I was just answering these people in my mind like ‘fine, let’s see, I’m pretty sure I am going to win this’. I was putting on a poker face but I was really on a mission because my teammates had been working for such a long time for me, I needed to win it for them. All the staff and the work they did too – we’d been working for it since October – I knew I had to bring it home.”
Of course, Longo Borghini’s season hasn’t been without its difficulties. A “stupid” crash in training took her out of the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift, and she was forced to watch the historic battle for yellow this year from home – something which left a sour taste in her mouth.
“I felt really embarrassed, silly and sad because I went down in training, and when you crash in training it is double the disappointment. I eliminated myself from a race I really cared about,” Longo Borghini says. “Watching the Tour for me was painful as I really wanted to be there. I was out of one of the biggest races in the world because of a stupid move.”
Returning to the peloton after that crash was yet another test of Longo Borghini’s resilience – one she passed with flying colours. She let herself heal and rebuild before coming back to her best level at the Worlds in Zurich, sprinting for a rainbow jersey and just narrowly missing out, coming home with a bronze medal.
“In the end, I just did what every athlete would do, I worked hard and I knew I would get back to my best level at the World Championships,” she remembers. “I always felt good and like myself.”
As her off-season comes to an end – one she has spent at home in Italy with her family and husband – Longo Borghini appears keen to focus on next season, welcoming her change in team with open arms. Two of her Lidl-Trek teammates, Brodie Chapman and Elynor Backstedt, will also head over to UAE Team ADQ with Longo Borghini and she’s confident that they will have a strong enough squad to battle next year in what is expected to be one of the most explosive women’s cycling seasons ever.
“I think the level of the entire peloton will be increasing a lot. With all these changes, it is going to be very interesting at the beginning of the season to see the new dynamics. I’m curious and looking forward to it.”
The Italian woman seems hungry for change and hungry to win. Elisa Longo Borghini likes a challenge, and this could well be her biggest one yet.
“After six years in the same place, you want to also see what's next door and it feels like year zero now, because everything is new,” she smiles.”The bike is new, all the equipment is new. You’re trying different things. It's like being at the first day of school again.”
