Elyne Roussel will remain with St Michel-Preference Home-Auber93 for the 2027 season, extending a relationship with the Aubervilliers team that began when she stepped directly from the junior ranks into the professional peloton in 2024.
The 20-year-old French rider has spent her entire senior career with Auber93 and will enter her fourth season with the team next year. There will be one important difference this winter: Roussel has completed her STAPS degree in Sports Management and intends to devote herself fully to cycling for the first time.
“I’m very happy to continue this journey with the team,” Roussel said. “The team has trusted me and supported my development since my junior years.
“Having now completed my STAPS degree in Sports Management, I’ll be able to fully dedicate myself to cycling, with the ambition of continuing to improve, playing a more active role in races while remaining committed to the team’s collective goals, and above all, continuing to learn.
“Thank you to the whole team for their trust. I can’t wait to write the next chapter together!”
Roussel has developed within the Auber93 structure
Roussel’s connection with the team predates her first professional season.
She arrived with a strong final junior campaign behind her, finishing fifth in the 2023 European Championships road race and 11th at the World Championships. St Michel-Mavic-Auber93 subsequently signed Roussel for the 2024 season, giving her an immediate route into the senior professional peloton.
She was only 18 during that first season and made history at the Tour de France Femmes as the youngest rider to start the race. Rather than immediately chasing individual results, much of her first three years has been about absorbing the demands of a professional calendar while continuing her studies.
There have still been signs of progress. Roussel finished 12th at La Picto-Charentaise and 13th at La Périgord Ladies during her debut season, while her 2026 campaign has included 25th at Omloop van het Hageland, completing Paris-Roubaix Femmes and a 17th-place finish at the Egmont Cycling Race in August.
The extension gives her another year to turn that experience into a more prominent role.
Pointe du Raz remains an important part of her early story
Roussel had already achieved a notable result before turning professional.
At 17, she won the inaugural Pointe du Raz Ladies Classic in 2023 while racing for Team Breizh Ladies. The race was then a two-day French domestic event, with Roussel placing seventh in the opening time trial before winning the road stage and overall classification.
The event has since developed rapidly, first becoming a UCI race and then moving up to ProSeries level for 2026. Roussel therefore remains the first name on a palmarès that now sits on the international professional calendar.
Our history of the Pointe du Raz Ladies Classic traces that progression from Roussel’s inaugural victory through to the modern one-day race.
She returned in 2026 as part of the St Michel-Preference Home-Auber93 squad, an appropriate link between the rider she was as a junior and the professional she is still developing into.
Finishing her degree gives 2027 a different feel
The most interesting part of Roussel’s contract announcement is not simply that she is staying.
For the first three years of her professional career, she has been combining racing and training with university work. Completing her Sports Management degree removes that competing demand going into next season.
Roussel has been explicit about what she wants to do with the extra capacity. She wants to become “more active” in races rather than remaining exclusively in a support role, while still contributing to the team’s wider objectives.
That is a realistic next step for a rider who only turns 21 in December.
Auber93 have been patient with her development since recruiting her as a junior, and the decision to extend that relationship gives both sides an opportunity to see what changes once cycling becomes her full-time focus.
Roussel stays as Auber93 build around their women’s team
Her renewal also comes during an important transfer period for St Michel-Preference Home-Auber93.
The organisation confirmed in May that it will focus its professional future on the women’s team from 2027, ending its long-running men’s professional programme and concentrating its elite resources on the Women’s ProTeam.
That decision has brought a mixture of recruitment and continuity.
Heidi Franz has extended for 2027, while India Grangier will also remain for another season.
The team have also been active in the market. Cristina Tonetti has signed a two-year contract as Auber93 add more depth and finishing speed to the squad being assembled for the next phase of the project.
Roussel represents a different part of that strategy. She is not a new signing brought in to change the team’s level immediately, but a rider developed inside the structure who still has significant room to improve.
A fourth season with more responsibility
Roussel will enter 2027 with three professional seasons behind her but still at an age where many riders are only beginning their transition out of the under-23 ranks.
Her first years with Auber93 have already taken her from junior racing to the Tour de France Femmes, the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix and a much broader international calendar.
The next step is to become more influential within those races.
With her degree completed, a familiar team around her and another full season secured, 2027 gives Roussel the opportunity to find out how much further she can move when cycling no longer has to share her attention with university study.
