AMMANFORD: The chance meeting that put a Welsh firm inside the Tour de France

When the Tour de France arrives in Wales next July, one Ammanford company will already know the world’s biggest bike race from the inside.

Cycle Champs, based at the Courthouse on Margaret Street, is the Tour’s official balance bike supplier — and its bikes for young children are carrying the race’s colours through towns and villages across Europe this summer.

Among the company’s directors and shareholders is Rhodri Williams — the Dragons professional who has worn the Barbarians shirt against New Zealand.

“I believe in Cycle Champs — it gives me a pathway after rugby and a chance to connect with top clubs,” he said when he joined the company, which works with schools and clubs using balance bikes to teach children to ride.

More than 1,500 of the firm’s balance bikes are in use in the Tour’s community legacy programme, the company says, introducing thousands of children to cycling along the route.

And it all began with a chance meeting. Tour representatives were at a London event the company attended — and an invitation to the race’s Paris headquarters followed, to pitch for a place on the world’s most famous race.

“A nervous wait then followed before receiving confirmation that we had been chosen as their official balance bike supplier for 2026,” said Hywel Thomas, head of partnerships and a director at Cycle Champs.

“As a small Welsh company, to be trusted by the organisers of the world’s biggest cycling event is something we’re incredibly proud of.”

The firm also holds the rights to make and sell official Tour de France balance bikes through retailers and its own online store — putting officially licensed race merchandise in the hands of the youngest fans.

This month the team saw it all pay off in person — invited to the Tour itself, watching children ride their bikes in the race’s fan parks and following the peloton from an official car.

“Navigating the mountains with thousands of passionate racing fans was an experience we will savour for a long time,” he said. “The Welsh fans have a lot to live up to next year!”

“We were immensely proud to fly the Welsh flag and demonstrate what businesses from our region are capable of achieving.”

Next summer the race comes to Wales for the first time: stage three runs from Welshpool to Cardiff on Sunday 4 July 2027, the final British leg of a Grand Départ that starts in Edinburgh two days earlier.

The route stays well east of Carmarthenshire, heading south through Llandrindod Wells, Builth Wells and Brecon before crossing Bannau Brycheiniog into the Valleys, where the peloton tackles the Côte de Rhigos and Côte de Caerffili on the run into the capital.

The company expects the race to drive a surge of interest among families and young children, and plans to grow its retail network and strengthen partnerships with schools, sports clubs and local authorities on the back of it.

Closer to home, it is working with local partners on balance bike sessions, school engagement and events in the run-up to the race — and hopes local businesses will sponsor balance bikes for schools, “ensuring children have the opportunity to learn to ride regardless of their background”.

“Our ambition is that when the Tour de France leaves Wales, it leaves behind more than memories,” Thomas said. “We want it to leave behind a new generation of confident young cyclists.”

The firm joins a county with a deep claim on the sport: Carmarthenshire has hosted the Women’s Tour of Britain twice, and Pembrey Country Park’s National Closed Road Circuit — the first closed-road cycling circuit in south Wales — opened in 2018 with £500,000 of council and Welsh Cycling backing.

Carmarthen Park’s velodrome, built in 1900 and among the oldest in the world, still hosts racing today — while Carmarthen’s Emma Finucane leads the Welsh cycling squad at this summer’s Commonwealth Games. From a 126-year-old velodrome to balance bikes carrying the Tour’s colours, the county’s cycling story now runs from its first riders to its youngest — with the biggest race on earth less than a year from Welsh roads.