After a superb spring, highlighted by victories at Dwars door Vlaanderen and the GP Gippingen, the Californian is coming into his own. This could be his year to win a Tour de France stage.

Neilson has always had the talent to compete with the best riders in the Tour de France. In 2022, he nearly rode into the yellow jersey on cobbled farm roads from Paris-Roubaix. He finished fourth on l’Alpe d’Huez. Now, in his eighth season as a pro, he is no longer the wide-eyed kid who just wanted to jump into every break he could and ride the front all day. Neilson has honed his race craft and been rewarded with big wins in one-day classics from Spain to Japan to Belgium. Now, he is determined to turn his string of Tour de France almosts into a career defining stage win.

Before the start of his sixth Tour de France, we spoke to Neilson about his journey from California youth triathlon and mountain biking leagues to this Grand Départ in Lille.

Growing up in California, it would be 6:00 AM or 7:00 AM, with the sun just coming up and my dad drinking coffee in the living room. I would walk in smelling coffee, see that morning light, and on TV, there would be these absolutely shredded athletes flying up mountains. I was like, ‘Man, how are they doing that?’

I was probably eight or nine years old by the time I could really understand what my dad was watching on TV all those summer mornings. I wanted to be one of those guys, so I started chasing that dream from a very young age. Obviously, I had no idea how to get there or how it was going to happen, so I just stuck with the sports that I was doing. I was riding my bike, doing triathlons at the time, so running, swimming, biking, but I always knew that the Tour was going to be the end goal. And I tried to work my way towards that from the age of eight or nine.

I was watching the Americans on TV at the time, and I figured that if there were Americans on TV doing that, there had to be a way for me to do it. I learned about development teams in America that supported young riders. There were a handful at the time. Then, I just started trying to find a way to get onto one of those development teams.

Luckily, there were a few options to pick from, so I started putting my resume out there and trying to get on one of those teams. I figured I would take it one step at a time. At the age of 12 or 13, I was thinking, ‘I don’t need to worry about getting that WorldTour contract right now; I just need to figure out how to get on a team that's going to get me a bike to race.’

So, I reached out to every development team – mountain bike, road, all of them – that I could. I ended up on this Whole Athlete mountain bike team from California and worked my way up through the grassroots ranks.

The first challenge was getting noticed in America and getting selected for the national team, so that I could show myself in Europe. The next challenge was surviving my first season of racing in Europe with the drive to continue. Development happened at such a quick pace in Europe. When I first got there, I was 10 steps behind, but it only took one to two years before I was feeling competitive.

That first year, I felt like I was in the wrong sport. I was just filling numbers in the pack, getting dropped, bonking, crashing. I never finished inside the top 30. I thought that bike racing wasn’t going to be for me, to be honest.

But I liked the life, cycling, and just Europe in general so much that I kept going with it.

I told myself, I'll just go back for one more trip, and then one more trip. Eventually, I started racing the finales of a few races, and getting in some breakaways and finding more success. At that point, I was like, ‘You know what? I think I can do this.’ I started thinking I could actually win some races.

In 2016, I won my first race in Europe. From then on, I was just thinking, ‘This is going to be my pursuit.’ I was going to be able to do it.

As soon as you get a contract in the WorldTour, which is an extremely hard barrier to pass, then you think, ‘Now that I've made it here, they think I'm good enough, so that means that I should be good enough in two to three years to make a Tour de France team.’ A couple of years down the road, you realize how hard it is to even make your team’s Tour de France team.

You go through some crazy personal growth periods as a cyclist, because you are always reinventing yourself to fit a role in a team or adapting your training or your lifestyle to improve on the bike and put yourself in a better position to try to win races or even just make some final selection that you've been hoping to make for years. It is a good sport for self-exploration.

I feel like my perspective is constantly changing and growing with lots of eye-opening experiences along the way.

My first Tour was pretty emotional. It just felt like this wave crashing down on me. It was all happening, all of the things that I'd been working towards. As soon as you're in it, you can feel the difference compared to every other race. I was really proud that I stuck with it and was able to get myself there. I was so motivated to do something at that event, because there are so many eyes on it and everybody lets you know how many eyes are on this race, while you are in it.

I got in four or five breakaways or something. It was pretty fun, but exhausting. I crushed myself.

My best memory from the Tour de France so far was probably the cobblestone stage in the 2022 Tour de France, when I realized I was fighting for the yellow jersey. I've been chasing that feeling ever since. It is so hard to get into that position.

That has been the thing that has motivated me for years now, just that feeling of being within reach of the maillot jaune, even if just for a day.

I want to win a stage. That would definitely make my career feel complete. I've gotten to the point where I've won some big races, and I've raced at the front of a lot of big races, and a lot of Monuments, but I must say that a win at the Tour de France, or wearing the yellow jersey, is still just the thing that's missing. Honestly, it's getting to the point where it feels like that's all that matters. I am trying to do everything I can to make that happen.

I’ve come to realize that I can rely on my race craft a lot, even in the third week, when I’m getting tired. I've become the type of rider that's quite opportunistic and punchy and strong, even if I am not the strongest in the race. I can lean on the tools that I've been developing over the last eight years as a professional and still find a way to race for the win. That is really going to come in handy at the Tour de France.

For me, winning a stage is obviously the goal, so I'll be looking for breakaways, probably in the first week, or, if I feel up for it, even racing from the favorites to try to win a stage early, because I think the course suits me really well. That first week looks really good for the type of rider that I am, so I will be looking for opportunities there. The course is super hard in the second half, but the first half is nice and open, so it'll be really exciting. They did a really nice job of making it an open, exciting race.

I also love being a teammate, especially when I know my teammate has a good chance to win. So, I’ll be bouncing back and forth between going for some chances for myself, and then helping out the other guys.

I have learned that you have to choose your days wisely. I tend to get in quite a few breakaways at the Tour, but if I'm in five, it’ll only be two of those that I really feel like I have the energy to go for the win.

You have to be careful, because you don't have unlimited bullets, not for each day, or over the course of the three weeks. It takes a lot out of your system to go in the break. So, you have to be smart about it. As fun as it is to get in as many breaks as possible, you definitely have to think about it a little bit and choose your day.

It is nice to race in the country where you live. It makes you feel a bit more at home. A lot more people recognize me here while I am out training, so it definitely makes me feel like I'm under the spotlight more than when I'm in the States where there are cycling fans, but it’s nothing like here. It just makes you feel like you are a part of something really big.

Good luck at the Tour, Neilson!