April 10, 2026
It's tough to pick out a "Queen" stage in this edition of the Basque Country because all of the stages have been hard but today would be it if you had to choose. There is over 4,000 meters of elevation gain on the day across 176 km and eight categorized climbs around Eibar. The first four climbs come in the first half of the stage, all are between 2-6 km long and average around 7%, as the riders make a loop to the East of Eibar and up to the coast through Deba and Mutriku. The finale should start early because, once back in Eibar with 73 km to go, the bunch will start the Krabelin, a 5 km climb at 9.5%. Bonus seconds are available at the bottom of the descent in Markina-Zemein before starting the 3.4 km, 6.7% Trabakua. The race will arrive back in Eibar one last time before the finish with 33 km to go to take on the 3.6 km Izua which averages 10%, and finally the 5.3 km, 4.3% Urkaregi. At the top of Urkaregi, there will be 12 km remaining, about half will be on a false flat uphill road following the Deba River upstream and into Eibar.
Race Summary
When live coverage began with 83 km to go, there were two leaders, Baptiste Veistroffer of Lotto Intermarché and Steven Kruijswijk of Visma-Lease a Bike. They were being chased by a group of around 30 riders at just over 1 minute that included Juan Pedro López of Movistar, Marc Soler of UAE-XRG, Ben Healy of EF-Education EasyPost, Kévin Vauquelin of Ineos, and Anders Johannessen of Uno-X Mobility but no one was particularly threatening on the GC. The peloton were further behind at 3 minutes but the description of "peloton" was a bit exaggerated because only around 25 riders were within the group.
Bahrain Victorious were driving the pace hard into the foot of the Krabelin and had the two leaders at 1 minute 45 seconds and the middle chase group were just 30 seconds ahead. About halfway up the Krabelin, the first attack from the peloton came from Florian Lipowitz of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe. Race Leader Paul Seixas of Decathlon CMA CGM was straight on the wheel and the pair quickly reach dropped riders from the original break away. They passed through every rider up the road with the exception of Vauquelin who was the last man standing from the break. Nicolas Prodhomme of Decathlon CMA CGM did a fantastic ride to get back up to Seixas and he started to pace on the steepest slopes in the last 1,500 meters of the climb. Prodhomme led the group through the thick crowds near the top and over, 13 seconds behind Vauquelin. Many of the riders from the break were able to hang on to the top and the group was actually quite large at around 20 riders for the start of the technical descent. Also able to join the group was Matthew Riccitello of Decathlon CMA CGM and Primož Roglič of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe.
The descent was rapid and the group split as they caught Vauquelin with 58 km to go. At the bottom, the front group consisted of Soler, Vauquelin, Roglič, Lipowitz, Seixas, Prodhomme, Ion Izagirre and Alex Aranburu of Cofidis, Pello Bilbao of Bahrain Victorious, Alex Baudin of EF-Education EasyPost, Christian Scaroni of XDS-Astana, and Javier Romo Movistar. A handful of dropped riders returned with 51.5 km to go as the road started to grade upwards towards the Trabakua.
Trabakua was more of a highway climb which made it beneficial to just sit on the wheels. With 48 km to go, about 2 km from the top, Soler attacked with Healy following but everyone else was tucked in behind Decathlon CMA CGM who were happy to just set a good tempo to keep as many teammates around Seixas as possible. Mattias Skjelmose of Lidl-Trek and quite a few others rejoined the main body of the peloton to make around 30 riders with 44 km to go over the top of the Trabakua, 40 seconds behind Soler and Healy.
Soler and Healy made their through Eibar and started the Izua with 31 km to go, just 30 seconds ahead of the favorites group. Decathlon CMA CGM lined out the group with Prodhomme on the front but it wasn't long before Seixas was left to apply his own pace. Healy and Soler were caught shortly after and the group was whittled down to Seixas, Izagirre, Lipowitz, and Roglič. Lipowitz accelerated just outside 2 km to the top which shed Izagirre and Roglič. Roglič dangled at around 10 seconds for quite a while but was caught by a resurgent Romo and the Slovenian started to drift away near the top. The last kilometer was a tunnel of fans and just near the top, Romo reached the back wheel of Lipowitz when the Spaniard was clipped by someone in the crowd. He overlapped wheels with Lipowitz and went down. Seixas led Lipowitz over the top with 20 seconds on Roglič with Romo back up and riding somewhere in the middle.
After the descent with 17.5 km to go, Roglič and Romo joined up together at 23 seconds behind Seixas and Lipowitz just at the start of the Urkaregi. Lipowitz was working with Seixas on the shallow climb and by the top with 12.5 km to go, Roglič and Romo were a full 30 seconds down. Seixas took a few risks on the descent but Lipowitz handled the turns just fine and the pair reached last 6 flat kilometers with a gap of 35 seconds to a group of nine that had absorbed Roglič and Romo. Also in the group was Izagirre, Vauquelin, Baudin, Harold Tejada and Clément Champoussin of XDS-Astana, Pello Bilbao of Bahrain Victorious, and Romo's teammate, Cian Uijtdebroeks. There was little to no cohesion in the chase and the gap had grown to nearly 1 minute as the leading duo went under 1 km to go.
The road got very narrow to just one car width at 800 meters to go as Lipowitz made his first attack. Seixas was right on the wheel but Lipowitz kept powering away on the front. Lipowitz acted like he was only interested in time on GC because he never looked around at Seixas. Only in the last 150 meters did Seixas come out of the slip stream to nip passed Lipowitz to take the win in the sprint. Romo snuck away from the rest of the chase and came home for third place, 1 minute 3 seconds down with the remnants of the chase a further 8 seconds behind.
Seixas has extended his lead on GC to 2 minutes 30 seconds to Lipowitz, with Roglič dropping to third at 3 minutes 40 seconds. The performance by Seixas has been nothing short of dominant with one more day in the Basque Country remaining tomorrow.