Quinn Simmons Didn't Win a Stage, But Won Over Tour de France Fans in 'Ricky Bobby' Style

Quinn Simmons didn’t win a stage, but his red-white-and-blue Tour de France ends with a fitting prize.

The American headed into Paris on Sunday resplendent in a full Ricky Bobby tracksuit. Huh?

On Saturday, Simmons spotted a fan waiting outside the Lidl-Trek bus and traded his U.S. national champion’s jersey, complete with his Tour race bib, for the replica inspired by the NASCAR comedy Talladega Nights.

Simmons even ditched his team-issue kit and proudly wore it aboard the TGV carrying the Tour de France peloton to Sunday’s final stage in Paris.

Stage win or not, Simmons won over plenty of fans during the past three weeks.

Simmons drew huge cheers across this Tour as cycling fans embraced the high-fiving, flag-waving “Captain America.”

The former junior world champion is wrapping up his fourth Tour, and in three of those he’s worn the stars and stripes as U.S. national champion.

That makes Simmons — sporting long red hair and a Hulk Hogan-style mustache and beard — even easier to spot.

“They love the American jersey, it seems,” Simmons said. “Part of that also comes from the way we raced last year. I had quite a good Tour and with performances also come the fans. And if you can do it in a nice way, people like that.”

Earlier this week outside the Lidl-Trek bus, one fan even showed up dressed as a Quinn Simmons doppelgänger, replete with national champion’s jersey, flowing hair and beard.

Simmons has occasionally stirred the pot on social media, but Europeans seem to love his all-out racing style and larger-than-life WWE persona.

The flamboyant Simmons — one of five American starters in this year’s Tour — always races like he’d rather blow up trying than safely sit on the wheel.

“If you ain’t first, you’re last,” he posted on Instagram during this Tour, adding his trademark #americanmuscle and American flag signature.

Simmons raised eyebrows in the middle of this Tour when he claimed that Lidl-Trek cared more about helping Mads Pedersen win green than chasing a stage victory with him.

That didn’t stop Simmons from doing his job.

He barreled into seven breakaways, matched his career-best second place in stage 4 behind Pedersen’s win, helped the Dane secure the green points jersey, and paced struggling GC man Juan Ayuso up Alpe d’Huez.

And there’s Sunday’s finale with four laps over Montmartre still to go.

All that attacking wasn’t enough to sway the Tour jury. Officials instead awarded Richard Carapaz, winner of two stages and the King of the Mountains jersey, the prestigious super-combativity prize.

Tour officials did award him the “best teammate” prize for the 2026 Tour.

‘The Tour de France is why you want to be a rider’

It hasn’t always been smooth sailing for Simmons.

He battled illness and injuries, watched fellow junior world champion Remco Evenepoel blast past him, and even told Velo he nearly walked away from the sport after witnessing Gino Mäder’s fatal crash at the 2023 Tour de Suisse.

He turned pro at Lidl-Trek in 2020, and seven years into his career, he is only 25.

This season has been one of his best, with a third U.S. title, second at GP Miguel Indurain, and a stage win at the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes in June.

And, of course, attacking like a banshee all across France.

One of the Tour’s feel-good moments came in stage 12, when his parents, Scott and Holly, flew in from the United States. They posted up alongside the course near to the finish, and the scene went viral of Simmons high-fiving his father as he pedaled past.

“I thought to myself, ‘if Quinn is going to attack, he’ll probably do it right around here,” he told Velo of the short hill, about 35 kilometers from the finish in Chalon-sur-Saône. “Sure enough, I’m standing there and see him coming up. Attacking, hauling everyone. I was like ‘whoa!’”

The Tour has fascinated Simmons since childhood growing up in Colorado, even if he wasn’t initially convinced.

“My earliest memories of the Tour were when my dad would put it on TV in the summer, and my brother and I were mad that we had to turn off our cartoons,” Simmons said. “Probably the first time it really caught my attention was watching Sagan, some cool uphill finish or something like that, and just feeling the hype around it.”

Simmons’ Tour ends Sunday in Paris. You can almost guarantee that he will attack on the tricky final circuit.

“Especially for an American rider, it’s the only time cycling is really a sport,” Simmons said of the Tour. “That’s why we’re here. That’s why you want to be a rider.”

Last year, Simmons dropped to one knee on the Champs-Élysées to propose to his girlfriend.

This year, he’s rocking into Paris with his Ricky Bobby tracksuit.

Simmons has always raced proud and loud.