Valued at almost NT$5,000,000, the twelve bikes and other kit that vanished overnight from the Unibet Rose Rockets team van in Poitiers, France, as they were on their way to race in Spain, posed a huge problem for the team. 

They awoke to a smashed window and a forced door – and an empty van. The team ride Rose’s Shave and Shave FF and FFX race bikes, retailing around $330,000, with the SRAM Red AXS spec the Rockets race. Twelve of those gone is a serious hit, and it briefly threatened the team’s entire race week. 

What saved the day wasn’t insurance or CCTV — it was a mechanic’s habit of putting an Apple AirTag inside his toolbox. Itpinged near a golf course just around the corner from the team’s overnight stop, leading police to a car loaded with stolen wheels, helmets, and gear. The bikes turned up soon after being traced to an apartment in the city.

“We had an Airtag in the toolbox, which they had also taken,”  team founder Bas Tietema said. “Suddenly, we saw that it began to move. That gave us a trail and became our salvation. Without that tag, we would have never found the equipment.

“All those bikes were locked into the truck using special quick-releases. Unfastening them takes time and requires technical knowledge of how team trucks are built.”

European bike theft is organized, opportunistic yet also at times meticulously planned, and relentless. Team vans are soft targets — predictable stops, valuable kit. 

Hope that mechanic gets a raise in salary! 

Jokes aside (was that a joke?), there is a pattern here:

Unibet Rose Rockets — Poitiers, France, July 2026
See above.

Cofidis — Tour de France, July 2025
Eleven Look 795 Blade RS bikes stolen from the team truck after the door was forced open overnight, despite the security measures the team had in place, including a polka-dot-themed bike built for then-KOM leader Benjamin Thomas. No recovery reported.

Visma-Lease a Bike — Vuelta a España start, Turin, August 2025
Eighteen bikes stolen from the team truck days before TotalEnergies were hit.

TotalEnergies — Tour Poitou-Charentes, August 2025
Twenty ENVE bikes stolen overnight, just days after the Visma raid — same region, same method.

Italian national team — Romania, date unclear
Twenty-two high-performance bikes worth an estimated €600,000 stolen; Romanian police detained four suspects and recovered the bikes — a rare full resolution with arrests.

Jakroo Handsling — London, March 2026
A moped gang in balaclavas stole one bike and damaged another in a “bikejacking,” threatening a team manager with a knife — violent street-level theft rather than a van break-in.

Overnight team trucks/vans at races are the number one target, France and the UK are current hotspots. GPS trackers and diligent police work occasionally deliver full recoveries, but most raids (Cofidis, Visma, TotalEnergies) end with bikes gone for good.