Ride Revolution turned down four or five UCI stage races this season. The invitations came; the team could not field enough riders to accept them.
The team, which tops The British Continental’s open team rankings so far this year, has announced that it intends to race at UCI Continental level in 2028. Next season is designated a transition year, with increased investment and rider support, an expanded UCI and international calendar, and a new top tier of around 10 riders supported as close to full-time as the team can manage. Rider applications and approaches to commercial and technical partners both open in the coming days.
We’re going to be quite open about the fact that our aim is to be a Conti level team in 2028
“We’re going to be quite open about the fact that our aim is to be a Conti level team in 2028,” team founder and manager Jake Hales told The British Continental. “We’re going to be completely honest that we won’t be Conti next year, but we’re trying to take a step into the middle for next year.”
Every WorldTour team now runs a development squad, and the strongest British juniors move into them directly. Hales argues that riders who arrive by any other route have little to aim at.
“What’s really lacking in the UK is a viable option for guys that maybe don’t want to do that straight away. Maybe are still at school. Maybe aren’t at the level as a junior. Maybe guys that come through a bit later.”
Hales points to Lewis Tinsley, now second in the open rankings with BCC Race Team, as an example of a rider whose step up has come during his under-23 years rather than before them. The domestic calendar has contracted over the same period, pushing teams overseas in search of racing.
What 2027 looks like
The 10-rider group is not a reorganisation of the existing squad. It sits above it.
“Not many of our current riders will make it into that top group because they’re not full time riders,” Hales says. “That’s what we’re looking to recruit, to sort of bolt them on the top, which will then enable us to provide the calendar for the guys.”
We’re looking to recruit, to sort of bolt them on the top, which will then enable us to provide the calendar for the guys
Riders including Clay Davies, Josh Housley, Harry Macfarlane and James Ambrose-Parish would continue in a second tier, still riding the major races but without the full international programme. The remainder of the squad would race mostly National B events and selected rounds of the national circuit series, with one or two riders joining each overseas trip.
The team expects to complete around 30 international days this season, taking in French, Irish, Polish and Belgian racing. Hales says neither invitations nor staffing have been the limiting factor.
Funding
The race team has been funded internally since it was founded in 2023, with what Hales describes as a small contribution from one coaching client. Next season will not run on a significantly larger budget.
“There’s a huge funding gap to where we need to get to for 2028. There’s not a huge funding gap for where we need to get to for next year.”
Sponsor conversations are under way and are weighted for now towards product rather than cash. Hales says the timing of the launch is deliberate.
“What we’re really trying to do, if I’m brutally honest, is get out there first before everyone else announces their bits and make it known to the riders what we’re doing, but also make sure that we’re getting our foot in the door with any sort of sponsor conversations.”
British Cycling
Ride Revolution has discussed the step with British Cycling informally. Hales describes those conversations as positive, and says the governing body’s firmest condition is evidence that a team can fund an entire season rather than simply begin one. Most of the additional cost, he says, is insurance rather than licence fees.
That account differs from the one JAKROO Handsling gave The British Continental in January, when co-manager David Streule described the requirements as opaque and said British Cycling had not made clear what was needed in order to progress. British Cycling said at the time that it holds one-to-one meetings with every domestic team expressing an interest in stepping up, and that viability is assessed case by case. Neither team has formally applied. Hales says being an established team rather than a new one has helped.
The domestic backdrop
Britain has one men’s UCI Continental team: the INEOS Grenadiers Racing Academy, which functions as an extension of the INEOS Grenadiers WorldTour structure. There are four British women’s teams at that level. The men’s scene had six Continental squads in 2019 and none at all in 2025.
When Saint Piran and TRINITY Racing closed at the end of 2024, Harry Tanfield and a group of allies were given a 10-day window, later extended by British Cycling, to assemble a Continental licence application for 2025. The funding did not come together. JAKROO Handsling, then Raptor Factory Racing, launched with a three-year plan to reach Continental level and examined the step last autumn without formally applying; co-manager Tony Poole said in January that the team hoped to submit a UCI registration for next season. Muc-Off–SRCT–Storck won the 2025 open National Road Series on an £8,000 budget and folded when further backing did not materialise. Aero CLCTV launched last November with a five-year target of reaching the Tour of Britain.
Ride Revolution opens rider applications and partnership approaches over the coming days. Hales says the team needs around 10 riders available to race full-time, a group it does not currently have.
Amended on 9 August 2026. An earlier version characterised Lewis Tinsley’s junior and first-year under-23 results in the article’s own voice. That characterisation was Jake Hales’s and has been attributed accordingly.
