PAULA BLASI, MAVI GARCÍA AND WHY ROLE MODELS MATTER: “SHE IS JUST LIKE ME, BUT 20 YEARS YOUNGER”

April 15 ^th 2026 - 11:00 [GMT + 2]

Key points:

• Despite turning her focus to cycling just two years ago, Paula Blasi already is one of Spanish cycling’s biggest hopes after becoming a European champion and a world medalist in the under-23 category.
• At UAE Team ADQ, Blasi has found a new mentor in Mavi García, a perfect role model who was also a latecomer to cycling after practising different sports earlier in her life.
• García and Blasi have become close friends and allies, on and off the bike, and will showcase their connection between Sunday, May 3, and Saturday, May 9 at La Vuelta Femenina 26 by Carrefour.es.

One of the many handicaps women’s sport has had to deal with has been the lack of role models and visibility. For a young female athlete, it was easy to watch events in which men were the stars and relatively harder to see women showcased. Women athletes’ run in the elite was in most cases precarious, and their careers used to have an early expiration date, marked by professional or family duties, making it difficult for their experience to be passed on. Luckily, the tide is changing. It’s easier to come across women’s sporting events on TV and social media - in cycling, races like La Vuelta Femenina 26 by Carrefour.es enjoy a wide coverage that enables junior riders to cheer the world’s best riders. And, if they are lucky and talented enough to make it to the pro ranks, their sporting careers tend to be longer, granting them a chance to bond with the next generation and share all their knowledge with them.

Back when she was a kid, Mavi García (1984, Marratxí) was a passionate figure skater. She later turned to tennis, running and duathlon before joining the peloton with Bizkaia-Durango at the age of 31. Ever since then, the rider from Mallorca has built an excellent sporting career, starring some of Spanish cycling’s landmark successes. The last two, and probably the main ones, were achieved last year: a stage in the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift and a bronze medal in the UCI Road World Championships held in Kigali (Rwanda).

2026 will be Mavi’s final season as a professional cyclist. She is enjoying it in the UAE Team ADQ outfit, and sharing it with Paula Blasi (2003, Esplugues de Llobregat). Like Mavi, this promising Catalan rider made it to cycling via an unorthodox path, when an injury drove her away from the passion for running she shared with her brother and from the interest for triathlon he got when studying Sports Science at university. She turned to cycling, and cycling quickly grew on her. Her progression has been meteoric, as she has risen from the amateur ranks (she joined the Massi-Baix Ter development team in March 2024) to the UCI WorldTour (she was promoted from UAE’s Continental team to its WWT squad in May 2025) in just 14 months. In the second half of the past season, she opened her Women’s WorldTour palmarès by winning the starting time-trial of the Tour of Romandie, to later take a bronze medal in the U23 Road Race World Championships and become the U23 Road Race European champion.

“I like the way she races.” During the Spanish National Championships held last year in Granada, where she took both U23 titles (ITT and Road Race), Paula Blasi already stated her admiration towards Mavi García, and the many parallels she could draw between them. “We both like to put on good shows, go on the offensive and make the race hard.” That’s exactly what they did in Granada, splitting into very small groups the bunch that Movistar Team and Laboral Kutxa intended to keep tightly together. Movistar’s Sara Martín came away with the win, but for the first time we could witness a connection that has now become a friendship - on and off the bike.

Both Blasi and García see elements of themselves in each other. “Paula is just like me, but 20 years younger,” says Mavi. “We get along super well and we are quite similar. I feel we can speak about everything. There are many aspects of myself that I can recognize in her. The joy, the willingness to train hard and improve as a rider, the hyperactivity - we just don’t know how to sit on our hands! Despite the age difference, we spend a lot of time together because I want to share everything I know with her, so she can learn as quickly as possible.”

They spent all January together in Australia, and have been training together in Sierra Nevada throughout this early spring. “Paula is a ‘controlled disaster’, if that makes sense,” laughs Mavi. “I give and take a lot from her. I try to teach her the many lessons I’ve gotten about training, rest, nutrition, behavior and etiquette in the peloton and inside the team - all in all, what I have had to learn in order to become a professional cyclist. Earlier in my career, I never took days off or easy days because I thought that was the best way to progress. Experience has taught me it isn’t. Now it’s time for Paula to learn that, and many other things.”

In turn, Blasi has always felt like “a weirdo” in the peloton, both because of her inquisitiveness and because of her intense way of living cycling. “I enjoy training five or six hours a day, yet around me I’ve always seen the opposite - girls who just want to do ‘coffee rides.’ It’s good I now have Mavi by my side, because she enjoys going deep but also knows when it’s time to rest, and tells me without making me feel weird. Because I notice I sometimes struggle when I feel judged by others, even if I don’t want it to affect me.” Sometimes, mentorship consists of defending your pupil from her own insecurities.

Mavi and Blasi already delivered an impressive team performance in Australia, finishing 2nd and 3rd at the Tour Down Under - a race from which the young Catalan rider learnt a lot about tactics. They will now share part of the Ardennes campaign before heading to La Vuelta Femenina 26 by Carrefour.es. “I’d love to fight for the overall classification, and I think Paula can be up there with me,” says Mavi. “We will support each other and see how the race goes. Having her by my side will be a great source of help and motivation.” About the future of Paula beyond the Spanish Grand Tour, she believes she is “a talented rider with a huge engine, a winning mindset, kind enough to work for others, and capable of being a leader. We have to give her some time to grow as a rider but, if everything goes as it should, she is going to become a remarkable cyclist.”