Team Groupe Abadie unveils jersey and team for 2023 season

Mathew Mitchell

Published on February 1, 2023
in Women's Cycling

The newly Continental registered Team Groupe Abadie unveiled its new jersey and team riders for the 2023 season at the JOA Casino in the Pyrénées-Orientales town of Le Boulou last week. The team has been a feature at the French national level and a regular at the lower-level Continental Coupe de France races such as La Périgord Ladies, GP Fourmies and GP d’Isbergues in the last seasons.

The link to the location of Le Boulou was clear in the team’s name until this year – originally racing UCI races as CC Le Boulou Fem in 2018, then Team Féminin Le Boulou in 2021 and then Team Group Abadie-Le Boulou last season. Riders like Chloé Schoenenberger, now of Stade Rochelais, Barbara Fonseca, formerly of St Michel-Auber93, and Anna Gabrielle Traxler who rode in the WWT for Roland Cogeas in 2022 have all been part of the team in previous seasons.

The team began life in 2012, racing in the French National Division 1 before calmly beginning to progress up the levels of women’s cycling. The investment by Group Abadie, which does industrial and business electrical solutions, has seen the team able to reach the ranks of the Women’s Continental level. As a team local to the vicinity of where the Tour de France Femmes will be held, Team Groupe Abadie has ambitions to make the start list of the 2023 Tour de France Femmes, which will notably crest the Col du Tourmalet. Team Groupe Abadie is the only French women’s Continental team based in the south of France.

The team took the opportunity to unveil its 12 riders for the 2023 season and a slightly different style jersey that feels almost a throwback to some of the former Women’s WorldTour leader jerseys before they turned blue and mauve in recent years. The biggest name on the team for 2023 is probably Manon Souyris, formerly of the early version of FDJ-Suez between 2012-2014 and subsequently Stade Rochelais Charente-Maritime between 2020-2022.