From selfless stars to tireless workhorses – Our pick of the best domestiques of 2026

While many season round-ups focus on the headlines grabbers of the year, like those who have won the biggest races, the best teams and the most memorable moments, here we take a look at those riders who have made notable sacrifices in service of others.

From the Spring Classics to the Grand Tours and the World and European Championships, plenty of riders have excelled in a domestique role.

We've witnessed notable performances from riders working for their leaders, including Demi Vollering, Enric Mas, Lorena Wiebes, and Jonas Vingegaard, who have swept to glory at races throughout the season.

A host of riders, including several from many of the top teams of the men's and women's pelotons, could've made our list, but we've tried to limit the repeats. It's impossible to mention just one rider per team, however.

Read on for a selection of the top domestiques of the 2026 road racing season.

Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike)

Of course, Belgian racer Wout van Aert is a star in his own right. This year he won eight races, with his Paris-Roubaix triumph a career highlight before rounding off his year with points glory at the Vuelta a España.

He also won two stages at the Spanish Grand Tour, but his super-domestique work was just as notable. Van Aert did what few other stars of his calibre do and put his own chances aside day after day in service of his teammate, second-year pro Matthew Brennan.

The 21-year-old Briton was indisputably the best sprinter at the Vuelta, sprinting to five wins – in Manosque, Roquetes, Lorca, La Rábida, and Seville. His quintet of triumphs wouldn't have been possible without his Belgian teammate, who was the last man in the train.

"I'm with a team full of massive champions. You've got guys who have been on podiums in Grand Tours and won them as well, and you've also got guys who have won big classics in some huge races. The fact that they go for me each time is an amazing opportunity, and I'm really thankful that they go full gas for me," Brennan said after his stage 11 win.

Their teamwork in the breakaway on the road to Loja on stage 13 (Van Aert eventually won) was a highlight of the race, while Christophe Laporte also played a vital role in the team's lead-out.

Célia Gery (FDJ United-SUEZ)

Demi Vollering was the dominant force in this women's peloton this year. In her second year in FDJ colours, the Dutchwoman swept to victories at Opening Weekend, the Tour of Flanders, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, and two of cycling's three Grand Tours – the Giro d'Italia and the Tour de France Femmes.

Plenty of her teammates deserve a nod for their work in her service this season, including Lauren Dickson, Juliette Berthet and Evita Muzic on the climbs and Paris-Roubaix winner Franziska Koch on the flatter ground. It's French champion Célia Gery who gets the nod here, though.

The 20-year-old is a future star of the sport, and she's learning first-hand from Vollering, who she raced alongside at Flanders, the Giro, and the Tour, playing a pivotal role in helping her team leader win each race.

There was a brush with controversy along the way in France, but she and her team overcame it to seal the yellow jersey in Nice and, with it, Gery's reputation as one of this season's top domestiques.

"It does me even more good and gives me even more pleasure that Demi won given what happened alongside it. I'm really happy. It was a superb experience with the victory at the end of it. It's the dream scenario," Gery said after the race.

Gery will skip this winter's cyclo-cross season to undergo iliac artery surgery. She's hoping to be back to full fitness for the 2027 road season – will a Grand Tour leadership spot await her?

Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek, USA)

Quinn Simmons was voted the best domestique at the season's biggest race, the Tour de France, by the race jury, so it's only natural he makes our list.

He won the prize for the second summer in a row after featuring regularly in breakaways during the Tour, doing plenty of work for Mads Pedersen as the Dane stormed to his first green jersey victory.

Simmons and Lidl-Trek teammate Mathias Vacek proved vital for Pedersen in the breakaway to Foix on stage 4, setting up the former world champion for his and the team's sole stage win of the race.

His domestique work wasn't limited to the Tour, either, with Simmons also playing a major role in Brandon McNulty's surprise Road World Championships win. He and his US teammates – including another standout teamworker in 2026, Matteo Jorgenson – took to the front in the final 100km of the race in Montreal and tracked move after move in the final.

Simmons, who covered a major Mathieu van der Poel move for 50km before the chasers caught back and McNulty launched his solo move, played a key role in bringing the rainbow stripes back to the USA after a decades-long wait, part of one of the best displays of teamwork all season.

Jasper Stuyven (Soudal-QuickStep)

As with many other riders on our list, Belgian Classics man Jasper Stuyven is a leader in his own right, but this year his work for Soudal-QuickStep's sprinters shone even brighter than his own success.

Stuyven's first campaign at the leading Belgian squad brought an uptick in personal form, including podium finishes at Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, and two stages of the Giro d'Italia. He also played a major role in their sprint successes as they re-established themselves as the world's best sprint squad.

Stuyven spent much of his season racing alongside Tim Merlier and Paul Magnier, racking up 60 race days with the sprinters and helping them deliver 11 wins.

Those wins include Magnier's trio of triumphs at the Giro d'Italia, where Stuyven worked as the last man in the lead-out (almost winning himself in the chaotic finale in Naples), and Merlier's three in France, where he stepped up after designated last man in the line Bert Van Lerberghe crashed out on stage 6.

The new-look Soudal-Safety Jogger will continue to retool following Remco Evenepoel's departure, continuing to emphasise the Classics and sprints next year. Stuyven will undoubtedly continue to play the key role he did this season.

Femke Markus (SD Worx-Protime)

It's hard to pick a standout domestique on a team with the best sprinter in the world, but even Lorena Wiebes can't do it all herself. Femke Markus is our pick from SD Worx-Protime this season, the Dutch racer having played a role in 15 of the team's 39 wins.

Markus has been by Wiebes' side for 10 of her 24 sprint wins, including the dominant showings at the UAE Tour Women and Tour of Chongming Island and her In Flanders Fields victory.

Elsewhere, Markus was part of the team that came away with three wins and second overall at La Vuelta Femenina, while she also scored two wins herself – at the Antwerp Port Epic and a stage of the Eneco Tour. She's played multiple roles for the team this year, including controlling breakaways, aiding leaders as a Classics lieutenant, and working in the lead-out train.

Markus is one of seven riders departing the Dutch squad for 2027. She'll head to Visma-Lease a Bike, where she'll get more Classics opportunities and assist up-and-coming sprinter Nienke Veenhoven in the battle against Wiebes.

Davide Piganzoli (Visma-Lease a Bike)

Jonas Vingegaard dominated the Giro d'Italia in May, winning five stages on the way to an overall victory by over five minutes. But he didn't do it all by himself.

24-year-old Davide Piganzoli joined a growing Italian contingent at Visma-Lease a Bike over the winter and showed this year just what the Dutch team saw in him during three years spent with Polti-VisitMalta.

The climber was Vingegaard's right-hand man during the Giro, often operating as his last man in the high mountains even with Grand Tour winner and long-time super-domestique Sepp Kuss in the squad.

Piganzoli joined Visma with 13th and 14th overall finishes at his home Grand Tour already to his name. He certainly stepped up another level this time around, though, with a series of eye-catching rides in service of Vingegaard en route to eighth overall. Another new addition for this season, Tim Rex, also put in a notably big support ride through the mountains on stage 14.

He and Kuss picked up the pieces at the Tour de France after Vingegaard's crash and abandon to finish in the top 15 in Paris, while he also won the Route d'Occitanie, Tour de Luxembourg, and Giro dell'Emilia. Don't be surprised if he's handed Giro leadership next May.

Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM)

Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney may not have been able to replicate her 2024 Tour de France Femmes victory in another duel with Demi Vollering this summer, but her second place was certainly aided by a rider who looks set to ascend to outright leadership at Canyon-SRAM next season.

German 23-year-old Antonia Niedermaier has already shown what she can do at the Giro d'Italia, with her second place this season following previous sixth and fifth places. She showed her strength again on her Tour debut in August, though.

Niedermaier was by Niewiadoma-Phinney's side throughout the week, aiding her in tricky hilly stages to Belleville-en-Beaujolais and Tournon-sur-Rhône before racing with her leader on the lower slopes of Mont Ventoux as she ascended into yellow.

In the end, it wasn't to be for the Pole or her team as Vollering proved too powerful on the closing stages in Nice. But Niedermaier showed she was the Tour's top super-domestique, helping Niewiadoma-Phinney to second overall while finishing fourth in the best young rider's jersey.

Nils Politt (UAE Team Emirates-XRG)

Such is Tadej Pogačar's dominance throughout the season that some fans joke he can win races without a team. In recent seasons, his biggest triumphs have often seen him simply solo away, sometimes hours from the finish, and finish minutes ahead of everyone else.

That's not true, of course, even if he is by far the best rider in the world at the moment. Pogačar has an expensively assembled squad of some of the best domestiques in the peloton, including a host of riders who would lead plenty of other teams.

Among them are top GC riders such as Adam Yates, Isaac del Toro, and João Almeida, and a rider strong enough to win the Worlds, Brandon McNulty. Also on the list are the team's workhorses, Vegard Stake Laengen, Mikkel Bjerg, and Nils Politt.

The trio can often be spotted stationed at the head of the peloton, where they spend hours doing the less glamorous but important work of keeping the breakaway close and dragging back moves before Pogačar and other leaders do their thing.

This season, Politt took on that role in a trio of Pogačar-dominated races, Tour of Flanders, the Tour de Suisse, and Tour de France, and so his place here is well-deserved.

Enric Mas' Vuelta teammates (Movistar)

Few had expected Enric Mas to come away from his eighth Vuelta a España with the red jersey, given Tadej Pogačar was racing. The Slovenian's mid-race crash and abandon put Mas in the lead, though, and from there he was impervious as he raced to glory.

The 31-year-old was the strongest rider the rest of the way in Spain, and his Movistar teammates, missing Cian Uijtdebroeks after an early crash, stepped up in a big way, too.

Each played their part in the win, including Carlos Canal, Jorge Arcas, and Orluis Aular, who controlled the peloton day after day, and Raúl García Pierna and Pablo Castrillo, who raced in break after break to assist late on pivotal mountain stages. Iván Romeo, meanwhile, did plenty of work on the front when the road angled uphill, as it often did.

This is really a place for everyone on the Spanish team's Vuelta squad, but García Pierna, Castrillo, and Romeo were the standout performers during the toughest stages of the race as Mas had to fend off the likes of Felix Gall, Primož Roglič, and Richard Carapaz. Stage 14, when García Pierna and Castrillo made the break before working with Mas on the summit finish to Sierra de la Pandera, was a standout example of their teamwork.

Riejanne Markus (Lidl-Trek, Netherlands)

Femke isn't the only Markus family member on our list this season, as she's joined by older sister Riejanne.

The 32-year-old was a key cog in the Lidl-Trek machine during the season but also played an important role in the Dutch squad at the end of the season as Demi Vollering swept to World and European Championships glory.

Before that, Markus was prominent during the Tour de France Femmes in the summer as Lidl-Trek tried to disrupt Lorena Wiebes' sprint train in Geneva. Her 40km solo ride, only caught in the final kilometre, meant SD Worx-Protime burned their support riders, even if Elisa Balsamo couldn't overcome the Dutchwoman in the sprint.

After helping Isabella Holmgren to an impressive top-10 on her Tour debut, Markus later made the Netherlands squad for both major season-ending championships alongside Amber Kraak, Puck Pieterse, Femke De Vries, and Karlijn Swinkels.

Yes, they had the strongest teams in Montreal and Ljubljana, but Markus was still on hand to play her role in delivering two gold medals for Vollering and her nation.

Silvan Dillier (Alpecin-Premier Tech)

Swiss racer Silvan Dillier is another entry in the category of riders doing the hard yards at the front of the peloton for hours on end.

Almost a decade ago, Dillier raced to second at Paris-Roubaix and a Giro d'Italia stage win. Now, the 36-year-old firmly occupies the road captain role at Alpecin-Premier Tech.

2026 was his sixth season at the Belgian squad, and he's a trusted lieutenant to the team's stars, Mathieu van der Poel and Jasper Philipsen, spending 46 race days with the Dutchman and 39 with the Belgian this year.

He was there for all the biggest triumphs of the season, then, including the three Tour de France stage wins and the victories at the E3 Saxo Classic and In Flanders Fields. Of course, he wasn't the last man launching Philipsen in the sprint or pulling off the front as Van der Poel powered clear. Instead, he does the monotonous work on the front to set it all up.

His value as a domestique is perhaps best summed up at a race his team didn't win – Milan-San Remo – where he raced on the front for much of the longest race on the calendar, averaging 340 watts for four-and-a-half hours.

"I try to think about nothing, kind of meditating on the bike. I definitely try to stay positive in my thoughts, but the easiest way to do this is just think about nothing," Dillier told Cyclingnews afterwards.

"I try to break down my whole effort into smaller pieces; I had these 15-minute markers where I would eat something or drink something. And then, yeah, after a couple of these, when you really start to get into your rhythm and flow, 15 minutes actually passes by pretty quickly."

The road season might be at an end, but Cyclingnews isn't slowing down. Subscribe for unlimited access to our comprehensive news coverage, industry-leading CN Labs testing, expert columnists, and so much more. Plus, the Cyclingnews app means you can stay up-to-date wherever you go! Join today.