Trhas Teklehaimanot Tesfay will join Team AMANI for the 2027 season, giving the Ethiopian climber a route back into international racing after several years in which conflict, visa problems and the difficulties of starting a new life in Britain interrupted her career.
The 24-year-old, a former African junior time-trial champion and double Ethiopian national champion, has been confirmed as the latest addition to the all-African women’s team. AMANI began racing at UCI Continental level in 2026 and is building towards its ambition of reaching the Tour de France Femmes in 2028.
From Tigray to the African junior title
Tesfay grew up in Tigray, northern Ethiopia, in a family where cycling was already part of everyday life. Two of her brothers raced, and she followed them into the sport as a teenager. She started competing at around 15 and soon found that climbing suited her best.
Her early progress brought an African junior individual time-trial title in 2019, as well as a place at the UCI World Cycling Centre in Switzerland later that year. She subsequently raced for the Spanish Continental team Soltec before winning both the Ethiopian elite national road race and individual time-trial championships in 2023.
Those victories should have taken her to the UCI Road World Championships in Glasgow. Instead, her visa arrived too late for her to compete. She travelled to the UK after the event had finished, while the effects of the war in Ethiopia’s Tigray region made returning home a difficult prospect.
“I came to the UK after the World Championships because my visa was issued too late, after the race had already finished,” she explained in Team AMANI’s announcement.
A career affected by visa delays and life in Britain
Tesfay continued riding and tried to compete in British races, but her circumstances made it difficult to maintain the training and racing programme of an international athlete. Away from her family, she faced uncertainty over her immigration position and had limited resources while living in temporary accommodation.
Her situation received attention in 2024 when cycling organisations and community groups worked to help her continue training. The Cyclists’ Alliance, Africa Rising Women, West London Welcome and the UCI World Cycling Centre were among those she thanked in announcing her new contract.
There was another opportunity to attend a World Championships in 2024, this time through the refugee team, but outstanding immigration and travel-document arrangements stood in the way. Tesfay continued to ride in Britain rather than giving up the sport, although the international career she had been working towards remained difficult to sustain.
She says her current travel arrangements now allow her to take up the opportunity with Team AMANI. The signing offers a more stable racing pathway, but she will still need to rebuild the rhythm of competing regularly in an international peloton.
Tsgabu Grmay sees a rider with unfinished business
Team AMANI’s head of racing, Tsgabu Grmay, knew Tesfay as a junior in Ethiopia. The former professional, who became the first Ethiopian rider to compete in the Tour de France, described her as one of the strongest young prospects from Tigray but said the lack of money and international opportunities had restricted her progress.
“She was one of the most talented girls we had in Tigray, and a real fighter,” Grmay said. He believes joining a team built around the challenges African riders face will give Tesfay another opportunity to demonstrate her abilities.
The structure matters as much as the jersey. Team AMANI is an Ethiopia-registered women’s Continental squad whose 2026 programme included European road races, with riders drawn from Ethiopia, Rwanda and other East African countries. Its stated purpose is to offer a racing route that is not closed off every time an athlete encounters difficulties with travel, funding or access to teams.
Ashleigh Moolman Pasio is due to join AMANI as general manager in 2027, bringing experience from the Women’s WorldTour to a programme that aims to compete at a women’s Grand Tour by 2028. For Tesfay, the immediate task is to re-establish herself in regular competition before thinking about that longer-term ambition.
The Tour de France Femmes remains her ambition
Tesfay will be reunited with Ethiopian riders she grew up alongside, but she is also joining an organisation whose aims reach beyond individual results. Her experience of being unable to race because of paperwork is precisely the sort of barrier AMANI says it wants to help African athletes navigate.
“I will be a cyclist again, with the opportunity to write the next chapter of my story,” Tesfay said. She has made no secret of her ultimate ambition: “My dream is to ride the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift.”
That remains a substantial step from her current position. The first requirement will be a full 2027 programme, the chance to race consistently against European opposition and time to recover the competitive level she showed before leaving Ethiopia. After several years in which getting to a start line was itself a challenge, the contract gives her a way to concentrate on racing again.
