In the absence of his nemesis Tadej Pogacar, Vingegaard, the two-time Tour de France winner and reigning Vuelta champion, is the bookmakers’ choice to win La Corsa Rosa. It’s not hard to see why.Colombia’s Egan Bernal (Netcompany INEOS) and Australia’s Jai Hindley (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe) both won the Giro in 2021 and 2022 respectively, but neither will have caused Vingegaard any sleepless nights before the grande partenza in Bulgaria on Friday, live on TNT Sports and HBO Max.
The Dane’s list of rivals got that much smaller, again, with the withdrawal of Ecuador’s Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EastPost), the 2019 champion currently recovering from surgery to remove a perineal cyst. Ouch.
With last year’s runner-up Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) also waylaid by a leg injury from Itzulia and Britain’s Simon Yates now retired, none of last year’s podium will feature in the race 12 months on.
Portugal’s Joao Almeida – the only rider to give Vingegaard a run for his money last September in Spain – has pulled out because of sickness, opening the door to Italian glory that little bit wider for the favourite. Add to this the glaring absence of Remco Evenepoel, Primoz Roglic, rising star Paul Seixas, who is heading for Le Tour, and the injured veteran Mikel Landa, and Vingegaard could simply be going through the motions in his bid to complete a Grand Tour triple that has so far eluded his big rival, Pogacar.
How Vingegaard should attack Giro – Voigt
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Play his cards right and the Dane could even arrive at the Tour fresh and in form before an attempt to replicate the Slovenian’s Giro-Tour double from 2025 and thus denying Pogacar a record-equalling fifth Tour triumph.
But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. First up, the Giro. Here are the contenders…
The favourite: Jonas Vingegaard
It will take a miracle or misfortune for the 29-year-old Dane not to complete his Grand Tour grand slam in Rome on May 31.
Not only has Vingegaard won both his stage races this year – Paris-Nice and Catalunya – he is a two-time Tour de France winner and the reigning Vuelta a Espana champion. With climbers Sepp Kuss, Wilko Kelderman and Davide Piganzoli in support, plus old-hand Victor Campenaerts as road captain, Vingegaard’s Visma-Lease a Bike team is solid enough over all terrains.
Surely victory is a formality for Vingegaard. And if he plays his cards right, he could even use this cakewalk of a Giro as the perfect preparation for his Tour de France bid in July.
Vingegaard promises ‘more’ to come after ‘amazing start’ to season
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The challenger: Giulio Pellizzari
The arrival of Evenepoel at Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe added yet another GC star to a roster already stacked with all-round talent. But in the absence of both the Belgian and the Slovenian veteran Roglic, Pellizzari has a chance to be Red Bull’s outright leader from the outset.
Still only 22, Pellizzari came sixth in both the Giro and Vuelta last year, winning a maiden Grand Tour stage in Spain in style on the Alto de El Morredero.
Third at both the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana and Tirreno-Adriatico this term, Pellizzari arrives at the Giro off the back of his career first GC win in the Tour of the Alps, where his dual victories in Stages 2 and 5 saw him stave off the threat from Ineos duo Bernal and Thymen Arensman.
Victory over Vingegaard might seem fanciful. But should the Dane slip up, the Italian tyro will have a hell of an opportunity on home soil. As it is, a podium finish is a very realistic target.
Highlights: Pellizzari wraps up first career GC title with sublime Stage 5 win
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The former winners: Egan Bernal, Jai Hindley
Is there a more under-rated, under-the-radar Grand Tour winner than Hindley? The Australian won the Giro in 2022, two years after being denied victory on the final day by Tao Geoghegan Hart.
Hindley has since finished seventh in the Tour, enjoyed a day in yellow after a solo win in the Pyrenees, and twice cracked the top 10 of the Vuelta. While he is Mr Dependable and highly consistent, he has yet to hit his previous heights – and has seemingly become something of a domestique de luxe for Red Bull’s swelling collection of second-tier GC stars.
A DNF last year on his first return to the Giro since his triumph, Hindley, 29, has had a quiet season. Yet to crack the top 10 in any of his 14 race days, Hindley could break that run by riding in support of Pellizzari this May.
Giro champion one year before Hindley, Colombian champion Bernal is slowly approaching his levels of yesteryear. The big problem is that, since Bernal won the Tour and Giro, the likes of Pogacar, Vingegaard and Evenepoel have exploded onto the scene.
Runner-up in the Tour of the Alps and fifth in Liege-Bastogne-Liege, Bernal, also 29, will co-lead a new-look Ineos outfit hoping to give new title sponsors Netcompany an early return on their money. It’s unlikely that he can take the pink jersey but finishing the top five would be progress and the final spot on the podium his likely ceiling.
Bernal’s ‘inspirational’ journey from ‘near-fatal crash’ to Vuelta victory – ‘A great human being’
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The forgotten men: Adam Yates, Enric Mas
With UAE Team Emirates-XRG team-mates Del Toro and Almeida ruled out, Yates could pick off where his brother left off last year and win the maglia rosa. But it would be a huge ask from a rider who has never finished higher than ninth in the Giro.
The 33-year-old has become something of a week-long stage race specialist in recent years, his primary role at UAE now – and Ineos before – being to support superior riders in their quest to win the yellow jersey in July. And with so many mercurial lone rangers at UAE, the prospect of Yates in pink seems rather fanciful, even if he coasted to victory in O Gran Camino in April.
The same can be said for Spain’s Mas (Movistar), who makes his Giro debut at the age of 31. Twice runner-up in the Vuelta, Mas is pulling up no trees this season, having come a lowly 24th in Catalunya. What he lacks in explosiveness, he makes up in grit and consistency – but while this might put him in good stead against some of the less experienced GC riders, Mas will be no match for Vingegaard.
Yates wins Stage 4 of O Gran Camino to take overall race lead
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The steady Eddies: Felix Gall, Derek Gee-West
The rapid rise of Seixas at Decathlon CMA CGM has made Austria’s Gall something of an anachronism on the French team, his next-big-thing promise reduced to everyman status in a flash.
Fifth in the UAE Tour and sixth in Catalunya will not make the 28-year-old one of the main contenders in Italy, where he came 50th in his Grand Tour debut four years back. But fifth in last year’s Tour and then eighth in the Vuelta underlines the potential returns from riding conservatively, so another top 10 is likely from Gall.
Canadian champion Gee-West, meanwhile, is still finding his feet since joining Lidl-Trek off the back of a disruptive final campaign at Israel-PremierTech, for whom his final race saw him come fourth in last year’s Giro. Still searching for that elusive Grand Tour stage win, the 28-year-old might be something of a lone ranger this May set against the more maverick abilities of his team-mate Giulio Ciccone. Talking of whom…
The mavericks: Giulio Ciccone, Ben O’Connor, Thymen Arensman
Italian climber Ciccone has yet to crack the top 10 of a Grand Tour, failing to finish six of his 15 appearances. That said, he was riding well in seventh place in last year’s Giro before a crash ended his race, while one bad day in the mountains saw him plummet down the standings in the Vuelta.
It would seem wishful thinking to assume that a rider in his early 30s will suddenly buck a trend that has lasted a career. But with Lidl-Trek deprived of a strong out-and-out GC contender beyond Gee-West, Ciccone may shine.
Co-leader of Netcompany INEOS, Dutch climber Arensman came third in the Tour of the Alps and looks to be riding into form. Sixth in his last two appearances in the Giro, the 26-year-old will eye the top five while completing his collection of stage wins in all three of cycling’s Grand Tours. Like Ciccone, however, Arensman always seems to have at least one bad day in the mountains.
Arensman joins Tour de France winners club as Pogacar sees off Vingegaard in sprint for second
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The same can be said for Australia’s O’Connor, a rider who often suffers from an early crash that has him playing catch-up for the rest of the race. On the occasion this didn’t happen, O’Connor put in a long run in red that saw him come within days of winning the Vuelta two years ago.
Fourth in his last appearance at the Giro in 2024, the Jayco AlUla climber does not arrive in Bulgaria with much form. But providing the 30-year-old can stay on his bike, he could use his experience and climbing ability to push for the podium.
The outsiders: Santiago Buitrago, Michael Storer, Jay Vine, Einer Rubio, Sepp Kuss
Colombian duo Buitrago (Bahrain-Victorious) and Rubio (Movistar) have both finished in the top 10 of two Grand Tours – the former in the Tour and Vuelta, the latter twice at the Giro. Neither will win it or even come close but their climbing ability and under-the-radar status could put them in the picture for the GC.
Meanwhile, the Australian duo of Storer (Tudor Pro Cycling) and Vine (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) are more likely to go on the attack and push for stage wins in the mountains. But this tactic, too, could result in a top 10 finish. Vine, however, tends to DNF every other Grand Tour, a sequence that would, if continued, see him crash out at some point this May.
Both riders have a track record of winning a brace of stages at the Vuelta – Storer in 2021, Vine in 2022 and 2025 – but neither has yet stood on the top step at the Giro.
Visma-Lease a Bike veteran Kuss famously won the Vuelta in 2023 when the stars aligned for the American. His job this May will be to continue repaying his leader Vingegaard for that act of generosity. Seventh in last year’s Vuelta shows that the 31-year-old is still a force to be reckoned with.
What next for Kuss after ‘life-changing’ Vuelta victory?
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Kuss could make the top 10 simply by riding in support of Vingegaard – but should Visma have to pivot to a Plan B, he has the skills in his armoury to become a GC factor, provided he doesn’t ship too much time in a long 42km time trial on Stage 10.
The unmentionables: Alessandro Pinarello, Davide Piganzoli, Aleksandr Vlasov, Andreas Leknessund
And, finally, the riders who, if circumstances go their way, could ride into an unlikely top 10, but won’t be pushing for any prizes.
Italy’s Pinarello (NSN Cycling) only lasted five stages in his Grand Tour debut at the Giro last year for Bardiani. But the 22-year-old has a top 10 in Tirreno and third place in O Gran Camino to his name this season and will be hoping to have a breakthrough race.
Pinarello’s compatriot Piganzoli (Visma-Lease a Bike) twice finished just outside the top 10 for Team Polti. While his role will be very different at Visma, the 23-year-old will hope that riding for Vingegaard will translate itself into some high finishes in the mountains.
Once a fringe GC player himself, Russia’s Vlasov has significantly dropped down the pecking order at Red Bull. But the 30-year-old has finished in the top 10 of three of his four stage races so far this year and narrowly missed out on the Giro podium back in 2021.
Norway’s Leknessund (Uno-X Mobility) has been off the pace this season after coming runner-up in the Vuelta a Andalucia back in February. But the 26-year-old came eighth in his Giro debut in 2023, so he knows what it takes in this race.
Rider ratings for the Giro d’Italia 2026
***** Jonas Vingegaard
****
*** Giulio Pellizzari
** Felix Gall, Egan Bernal, Adam Yates
* Jai Hindley, Enric Mas, Ben O’Connor, Derek Gee-West, Thymen Arensman, Santiago Buitrago, Michael Storer, Giulio Ciccone, Jay Vine, Einer Rubio, Sepp Kuss
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