Hey, I’m Yonatan

Join me on the ride: Doing my best to chase the pro cycling dream.

I’m Yonatan Uri, a 21-year-old road cyclist from Israel, and like many other people (believe it or not, there are quite a lot) my biggest dream is to become a professional cyclist, racing at the highest levels, and getting paid to do so.

On this Substack, I will write and update you about myself, my 2025 racing season and my journey of doing my very best to achieve my dream. I will occasionally write about other topics, probably cycling-related, but not necessarily.

What is my goal in starting this Substack?

At first, I realized that for many people around me, for whom riding a bike comes to their mind only once a year on “Yom Kippur” (more on what is “Yom Kippur” later), don’t really understand, or are able to understand, what it means, or feels like, to pursue a professional athlete’s career, especially in a sport that demands so much.

I realized that many people close to me don’t fully understand it, or maybe I just don’t explain it well enough.

So that’s how the idea for this Substack started. I want to try and explain it, sharing the point of view of cyclists such as myself, trying to succeed- most of the time feeling like you are not even close, but sometimes, feeling like you might just make it.

I will show you how this journey goes through a tiny 7 flatmates apartment in a remote spanish city called Alcoi, or in an amazingly beautiful village on the top of a hill in Tuscany, in the middle of nowhere. Although sometimes, when my roommates and I ran out of food, we needed to stop at the grocery store in the bottom of the hill, stuffing a kilo or two of basmati rice into our jersey pockets (for the non-cyclists reading this, yes, a cycling jersey has pockets) and climb back up.

On the other hand, racing in the Tour de l’Avenir, one of the biggest cycling races in the world, and the biggest that I have raced in so far, where I felt closest to the dream.

In this blog, I will share stories such as this, stories that have already happened and experiences that will unfold in real-time.

I will write about the highs and lows and how unromantic, “chasing the dream” really is. Even though it’s nicer to portray it that way.

Why in English?

The short and (a bit) wrong explanation is that the biggest writing platforms such as Substack don’t support writing right to left. I’m Israeli, and my native language is Hebrew. It’s the easiest language for me to write and express myself in . I assume I will have some weird phrasing and grammar at some points.

There will also be some anecdotes that might not work between Hebrew and English, or at least things I’ll have to explain. An example of such an anecdote is me writing “...which riding a bike comes to their mind only once a year at best, on “Yom Kippur”.

“Yom Kippur”, shortly and not accurately- is one of the holiest days in Judaism. According to religion, alongside other traditions- you need to full-fast the whole day. On this day in Israel everything is closed and everyone is staying at their homes, no one goes out. You also can’t drive, which results in empty roads. All of the kids are taking out their dusty bikes they haven’t ridden on for the past year to ride with their buddies around. If you are a cyclist visiting Israel next year on “Yom Kippur”, make sure to bring your bike and we could do an epic ride across Israel on all of the main roads.

And yet why in English?

Honestly, I want this Substack to reach as many people as possible. Among other things, that former teammates and people I have met along the way to read this and relate, thinking to themselves, “Hey I remember that, this was a disaster” or “Wow it reminds me the day when…”.

The only downside I can think of regarding writing in English is that I might lose some of the people back home who won't read some of the pieces because they are in their second language.

So What’s Next?

Cycling as a sport is getting younger and younger. What do I mean? The Barcelona football academy signs all of the most promising and talented 11-year-old kids, and eventually, one of them becomes Lionel Messi. The trend in cycling is similar.

The best cycling teams around the world are signing younger riders, with the hope of discovering the next superstar. Until a few years ago, riders my age were considered young, with more time to develop ahead of them.

As of now, I’m racing in the U23 Category— a category for riders under the age of 23. There are a few dedicated races for this age group in order to give the stage for the next generation of cyclists to showcase their abilities. Although, as I mentioned above cycling gets younger and younger and sometimes it seems that the best cyclists are under the age of 23 anyway, and for cyclists such as myself there is no chance of making it to the absolute top. I believe there are exceptions.

My last season on the U23 category

I was born in December, and in the end of 2025 I will be 22, meaning on 2026 I will be out of the U23s and I won't be able to race on those dedicated U23 races, and then the chance of succeeding in professional road racing will be much lower, some might even say impossible.

Without getting into details about the structure of road cycling, (Which I will explain in a separate post) the bottom line is that this is my last season in the young riders’ category, and beyond that it gets much harder to become a pro.

On this Substack, I will share my story and experiences, in my last year in the U23 category, doing my best towards my goals. I invite you to join me—subscribe, stay updated with my posts, and see where giving my best takes me.

See you soon in my next post,

Yonatan