EF Pro CyclingPro Team

Madis Mihkels’ favorite races are the northern classics. The Estonian champion loves competing in the wind and muck in Belgium and France and flies over the cobblestones. In 2024, he raced into the top-ten at Paris-Roubaix. Last year, in his first season in EF Education-EasyPost pink, Madis finished third at the Classic Brugge-De Panne. He thrives at high speed, brushing elbows with his competitors on the roughest, smallest roads. But Madis' ambitions will never stop, even after he's rounded the last corner of the Roubaix velodrome. He wants to go for wins throughout the year. One-day races, stages in the biggest tours—he wants to cross their finish lines first. He has already won stages at the Deutschland Tour and the Tour of Estonia. He has ridden the Giro and the Vuelta, finished on the podium at the European championships, and raced the Olympics. Now, he wants to step up his game.

Madis honed his speed on the BMX track, where he raced until he was 15. He's always been an athlete. He started competitive swimming at four years old and did all kinds of sports when he was a kid. He was pretty good at them all, but it was on a bike that he started to dream of being great.

Madis balances his need for speed and rough-and-tumble racing with a quiet life in Estonia. He was born and raised in Tartu and, despite his home country's harsh winters, still opts to live there, though he has recently moved to Tallinn, the capital. He enjoys spinning out into the forests on his bike, passing lakes and rivers on quiet, smooth, nearly car-free roads. Before the thermometer dips too far below freezing and the snow plows come out, he can always escape somewhere warm. As soon as the ice is gone, he wants to go home, where he can fish for pike in fresh, clean water.