The three-time Tour de France winner reveals to Rouleur that he had discussions about starting his own top-level racing team, but nowadays he's more focused on his carbon fibre start-up business and admiring what he believes is one of the best ever generation of riders.

R: What are you up to these days?

GL: We have our bike company, LeMond Bikes, which struggled with Covid and then with market issues, but we slowed everything down to stabilise and we'll survive. The reality is it's been the worst period for the industry in years. In 2016, I met a team of scientists who can lower the cost of carbon by 30-40% which is a really significant amount and that led to the creation of a carbon fibre start-up business called LeMond Carbon that will revolutionise the aerospace industry, wind energy and flying vehicles. It's been a monumental task to raise capital for it, but we're almost there and should start building our first facility in Grimsby in the UK in this year.

R: Why have you never worked for a team post-retirement?

GL: I've talked about it in the past but the '90s and 2000s left a bad taste in my mouth. In the early 2000s, I met with an oil company which was going to put $10m into a project to start a team. They asked if it was possible to win the Tour without drugs and I said 'no' and that was that; conversations were over. I love to talk about teams and strategies as well as training and I think I could add a lot of value to a team, but I'm 64 now, probably a little bit too old. I would love to be involved but we'd have to move back to Europe. I have to be honest – I do have some regrets leaving Europe. I'm a sun guy and we'd love to get a place in Provence in France.

R: Would you work as a commentator again?

GL: I loved working for Eurosport. It was a great time and I'd love to do it again but it wouldn't be the most opportune time right now. What was so fun about it was that you got to know the riders and see their interviews. It was also the first time I actually properly discovered France.

R: What do you make of cycling today?

GL: I think this generation now is one of the most enjoyable ever. The last five years have been the best racing years for a long time. Even though Tadej Pogačar has been dominating, it's been tight with him and Jonas Vingegaard and it's made the Tour exciting. I'd have loved to have had three riders pacing me up the climb like they do!

R: How do you assess American cycling right now?

GL: We can't count the Armstrong era so I think it's in its best ever period. The depth of riders now is really at a high level. Back in the '80s we had Andy Hampsten and myself and that was it. But this is the best crop of riders ever, and there's still young up and coming talent to come. Sepp Kuss would have been my dream teammate – I wish I had someone like that. I really like Magnus Sheffield, too. He's very young and he's got a lot of raw talent.

R: The US is the home of gravel cycling. Do you ride gravel?

GL: Looking back now, I was always riding gravel. In Minnesota, there are only so many paved roads, so I would have to ride on gravel all the time. I think road cycling has an almost impossible future in the US because of the costs of closing roads, and I think we'll see a lot of riders coming out of gravel racing, in the same way riders like Kuss have come from mountain biking. I've had a mountain bike since 1981 and at the end of my career I was doing two-to-three hours of mountain biking a week in the winter, even though road teams didn't want riders to do that. In my opinion – and you see it with the likes of Mathieu van der Poel and Tom Pidcock – cyclocross is probably the best thing you can do in the winter.

R: What's one way you'd change cycling?

GL: What I'd really like to see is riders making more money from the sport. Some do now, but the depth is top heavy. When I look at this sport and see how hard it is, and then read Pogačar is getting €8m a year, I say I want to be his agent because he's worth at least €15m. In the NFL there are some guys on $50m a year.

R: More races have circuit finishes these days. What are your thoughts on that?

GL: The big thing with cycling is that we don't have stadiums, but these circuit finishes are more spectator friendly and 100 per cent, people would pay for it if there was added value. Plus, it's a way to make money for the sport and the teams. Look at the finale of the Tour de France last year on the Montmartre circuit – what could be more exciting? There's so much you could do there from an event perspective, even just on 10k circuits. The Tour de France does a great job for VIPs, but they can expand their offering.

R: How can cycling attract more investment?

GL: It'll never be like the really big sports, as it's not got the big money from TV, but F1 does a really good job of creating a great environment to bring companies together. If cycling can develop a way of hosting races in attractive venues and focus on corporate hospitality, that would help. I'd love to have Google or some other big tech companies coming into the sport.

R: What would you like to see brought back?

GL: The seasonal championship. I won the Super Prestige in 1983 and what was great about it was that it brought riders to other races, not just the Tour. If you had a sponsor coming in with serious money, say €40m, you would offer value to riders, teams and the TV spectacle as riders would want to win the championship. It'd be nice to have an end of year winner like in F1, just to say who's the best all-round rider.