After months of delay, promoter RCS on Monday revealed the routes for the men’s and women’s Giro d’Italia, finally and officially confirming an Albanian start for the men’s race.
The eight-stage women’s race, in the second year under RCS’ management, features a difficult course, although the steep Mortirolo climb, rumored to be included, is not on the route. It then winds south along the country’s eastern side before a tough final weekend.
The men’s route sees a start just across the narrowest portion of the Adriatic sea, with three stages in Albania before jumping across the Strait of Otranto to Puglia, Italy. Both races feature significant summit setpieces, and while the Mortirolo won’t feature in the women’s race, it will in the men’s in a quintessentially Giro-esque final week in the mountains. Here are the highlights, but for full routes, check out the official pages for the women’s and men’s events.
Giro d’Italia Women – July 6-13
As with last year, the route starts with an individual time trial, this one in Bergamo. Stage 2 – the one that might have featured the Mortirolo – instead finishes with a grinding climb to Aprica that will further thin the field of contenders.
But the race mostly skirts the Dolomites proper before turning south for the race’s first real testpiece, the stage 4 summit finish in Pianezze, with an 11 km climb to Valdobbiadene that averages 7 percent. A straightforward sprint stage is then followed by a tricky, up-and-down route on stage 6 to Terre Roveresche.
The course is designed to focus the action into the final weekend, which features a queen stage on Saturday – the race’s longest at 157 km, that sees a never-ending succession of small hills before a summit finish on Monte Nerone, after more than 13 km of climbing and an average 8% gradient.
If the GC is tight, that sets up a tense final day with a lumpy route and three road circuits that take in the fabled Imola auto racing track, where the race finishes. All told, the route is 939.6 km long and features 14,000 meters of climbing, 1,000 meters more vertical than the already-tough 2024 edition.
Giro d’Italia Men – May 9-June 1
The men’s race gets underway in less than four months, with riders forced to wait for the route reveal originally scheduled for last October. While RCS never confirmed the reason for the delayed announcement, Albanian prime minister Edi Rama, a special guest at the presentation, cracked a joke that suggested the rumored political issues did play a role. “It was difficult to strike a deal with (RCS president Urbano) Cairo. If Greenland ever needs to negotiate with Trump, they should call Cairo,” he said at one point.
But the Albanian Grande Partenza will happen as planned. The race gets underway with an opening road stage around the capital, Tirana, followed by a short individual time trial and then a breakaway-style stage around Vloré.
Then it’s across the Adriatic to Puglia for several sprint and breakaway stages, with finishes in Matera and Naples that should be UNESCO-style highlight reels whether the racing has a Phlagraean intensity or not. The Giro leaves the first summit finish surprisingly late (by Giro standards), coming on stage 7’s finish at Tagliacozzo that features a finish in the double-digit gradients.
Week 2
Stage 9, to Siena, features a Strade Bianche-lite course with numerous small climbs and nearly 27 km of sterrato, the signature white gravel roads. Hard on the heels of that is the second (and final) TT of the race, a flat 28.6 test from Lucca to Pisa, with a finish right next to the famous leaning tower.
Much of the rest of the second week will be a battle between sprinters and breakaways, including the briefest trip over the border to Slovenia with the stage 14 finish at Gorizia. Unusually, the second rest day is on Sunday, setting up a seven-stage final brace of stages that includes the most difficult ones in the entire race.
Week 3
A leg-softening stage 15 (214 km on Monday the 16th is followed by a five-climb stage finishing on a 17 km climb to San Valentino. The Mortirolo features on a tricky stage 17 to Bormio, but its summit comes with some 50 km to race so it may not be a tactical factor.
The real kicker is stage 20, a 203 km monster that takes the field over the race’s high point, the 2,178-meter Colle delle Finestre – which features 8 km of unpaved road near the summit – before a finish at Sestrière. The final stage is the usual sprint-fest in Rome.
Who Will Feature
Start lists, understandably, aren’t yet set for either race, and the delayed route reveal may have played a role in that. Elisa Longo Borghini, now on UAE Team ADQ, attended the route presentation and plans to defend her 2024 title, and could face a strong field of challengers including, possibly, SD Worx-Protime’s Anna van der Breggen.
Tadej Pogačar, winner of the men’s race, doesn’t plan to return, but his UAE team has plenty of options to defend the No. 1 bib. Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe’s Primož Roglič, Soudal-Quick Step’s Mikel Landa and Visma-Lease a Bike’s Wout van Aert all have the race pencilled in, with teammate Jonas Vingegaard not quite ruling it out yet.
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