Julien El Fares has signed with EF Pro Cycling for the 2021 season, joining Fumiyuki Beppu and Hideto Nakane in moving to the WorldTour squad from Nippo Delko One Provence.
“I’m so grateful to EF Pro Cycling. I really look forward to showing the best Julien El Fares next year,” El Fares said in a statement released by his new team.
The Frenchman has been a professional since 2008 and he previously raced for Cofidis, Team Type 1 and Sojasun before linking up with what was then La Pomme-Marseille ahead of the 2014 season.
The biggest win of El Fares’ career came in 2009, when he won stage 1 of Tirreno-Adriatico in Capannori. He has completed the Tour de France on three occasions, and he has been an aggressive presence on the French calendar during his tenure at Nippo Delko One Provence, his local team.
“I still live in Manosque, in Provence, more famous for its magnificent lavender fields than for cycling hero Edouard Fachleitner. He finished second in the Tour de France in 1947,” said El Fares.
Now 35, El Fares said that he was keen to serve as a mentor to younger riders at EF Pro Cycling.
“I’m excited to bring my experience around European races to them and help the overall team in getting the best possible result,” said El Fares, who is the seventh new arrival on EF Pro Cycling for 2021.
The American squad has also signed Michael Valgren from NTT and Will Barta from CCC, as well as Colombian neo-professionals Diego Camargo and Danial Arroyave and the trio of riders from Nippo-Delko One Provence.
Nippo has been linked as a possible future co-sponsor of EF Pro Cycling. The Japanese company will also support a developmental Continental team, Nippo-Provence-PTS, after cutting ties with the Delko One Provence squad, which faced several complaints of unpaid wages during the 2020 season, with the UCI initiating bank guarantee proceedings.
