Neilson Powless Was Devastated to Miss the Tour de France. He Channeled His Disappointment Into a Huge Comeback Win.

Neilson Powless made up for missing the Tour de France for the first time in 6 years by winning his first race in 5 months.

The U.S. racer outsprinted Igor Arrieta (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) at the Tour of Austria on Friday for a huge comeback victory after the start of his season was torpedoed by a knee injury.

“I’m very, very satisfied, very happy,” Powless said Friday.

“I came here with the ambition of winning a stage, and I knew it was going to be 50-50 if I was good enough after such a long time without racing,” Powless said at the finishline. “But my knee’s holding up, and I feel really strong.”

Powless and Arrieta attacked from the main break of the day in stage 3 of the Austrian Tour before Powless dominated the uphill sprint.

After 13 months without a win, victory tasted sweet for the 29-year-old.

“It’s really nice to be winning bike races again. I wasn’t sure if it was going to happen at all this year,” Powless said. “But here I am, the first win, so it feels really nice.”

Powless misses Tour de France for first time since 2020

Powless has been a key presence in the small contingent of U.S. racers who’ve been selected for recent editions of the Tour de France.

He debuted at the Tour with EF Pro Cycling in 2020 to become the first tribally recognized Native North American to make the race.

He started and finished every edition since and collected top-10 finishes and time in the polka dot jersey along the way.

This year was different.

Powless was whacked with knee pain in February and has been in the infirmary rehabilitating from corrective surgery ever since.

His dream to debut at Paris-Roubaix had to wait, and the Tour was off the agenda.

“I told my coach that I just really wanted to win a bike race this year,” Powless said Friday. “I didn’t care where it was or how it happened.

“It just feels really good to already achieve that goal. I feel like I can finally put this nasty chapter behind me with surgery and a rehab that was really complicated. I feel so incredible.”

Powless’ program for the rest of 2026 is to be confirmed.

However, he just made himself a strong candidate for racing the Canadian GPs with EF Education-EasyPost and the Montréal road world championships with USA Cycling.

Gregor Mühlberger (Decathlon CMA-CGM) leads the 5-day Tour of Austria into stage 4 with a 1:31 gap over USA’s Kevin Vermaerke (UAE Emirates XRG).