April 21, 2026
There is no easy route when travelling by car or bike from Austria to Italy and that is what the riders must do today. The start is in Telfs with the first 26 km of the 148 km stage running parallel to the Inn River. Once in Brennbichl, the course cuts South and starts climbing the Pillerhöhe, a 9 km ascent at 6.2% with the last few kilometers at over 8%. There is a steep descent into Prutz where the race rejoins the Inn Southward for the 25 km up the Oberinntal valley to the base of the Passo Resia/Reschenpass. The category three test is 16 km long but only averages just over 3% and takes the race to around 1,500 meters above sea level. The next 50 km are all downhill through towns and villages of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol. There is a bonus sprint in Coldrano before the start of the summit finish at Val Martello. The final climb is only 5 km long but averages nearly 9% with a short 800 meter downhill to the actual finish line. There are more difficult days to come but today is the only summit finish so any rider not completely confident in descending the finish will want to leave their mark on the race today.
Race Summary
It was still cool at 11C (58F) but any cloud that lingered from yesterday was burned off and the riders were presented at the start under perfectly clear skies. Like yesterday, Emanuel Zangerle of Team Vorarlberg was the first attacker of the day. He was eventually joined by his teammate Dominik Röber as well as Oliver Stockwell of Bahrain Victorious, Mattia Gaffuri of Picnic-PostNL, Luca Verrando of Solution Tech-Nippo Rali, Davide Bais of Polti-VisitMalta, and Benjamin Eckerstorfer, David Paumann, and Valentin Poschacher of the Austrian National Team. With 64 km to go, the break were about halfway up the Passo Resia and had 3 minutes 25 seconds on the peloton with Tudor Pro Cycling, Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe, and Bahrain Victorious sharing the chasing duties.
The last few kilometers of the climb were very gradual and went by quickly. In the sprint for mountains points, Stockwell pipped Zangerle on the line to score maximum points and the group started the long descent with a reduced advantage of 2 minutes 45 seconds. The scenery at the top was spectacular with snow capped peaks surrounding the riders as they whizzed passed the glacier-fed waters of the Resia Reservoir.
The seemingly endless descent continued with vineyards and orchards appearing more and more frequently as the riders lost altitude. With 19 km to go, on the approach to the bonus sprint in Coldrano, the gap was down to 1 minute 10 seconds with Tudor Pro Cycling still drilling the pace in the peloton. It wasn't until 15 km to go that more teams pushed forward to position for the final climb to Val Martello.
The break was still leading through the bonus sprint in Coldrano and it was Bais who took 6 seconds. The peloton came through the line about 1 minute later led by Ineos and Jayco AlUla who had kept their powder dry all day and were ready to deploy their resources. When the official climb began, Tudor Pro Cycling regained control of the pace and burned riders off as they ripped up the first few kilometers. Up front, Gaffuri had gone clear of all of his breakaway companions and was holding around 30 seconds with 4 km to go. Ineos came to the front and managed to increase the pace which made a split near the front of the group. Thymen Arensman of Ineos was still there along with Michael Storer of Tudor Pro Cycling, and Lorenzo Finn of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe.
Arensman was lively and went on the attack at 2.7 km from the top. Finn and Storer had him matched but Arensman decided to sit on the front and continue to lead the group. A chase group of around 10 riders formed, led by the ageless Domenico Pozzovivo of Solution Tech-Nippo Rali who came out of retirement for this race at 43 years old. The gap was holding at around 15 seconds but with 2.3 km to the top, Giulio Pellizzari of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe attacked out of the chase group and was quickly across the Arensman, Storer, and Finn. Egan Bernal of Ineos was about to bridge up as well when Pellizzari hit the group with a blow and immediately built a lead.
Pellizzari made contact with Gaffuri 1.3 km from the top and the lone survivor of the break was able to stay with Pellizzari. Behind, a chase had formed with teammates Bernal and Arensman swapping turns as Finn sat on with Pellizzari up the road. Storer was out of the picture at this point which would have been disappointing given the amount of work Tudor Pro Cycling did the whole day. The chase by Bernal and Arensman was strong enough to haul Pellizzari and Gaffuri back just 500 meters from the top with only the short 1 km downhill afterwards. Finn went to the front to keep the group together with a hard tempo and the five riders went over the top together with Aleksandr Vlasov just behind, trying to make it three at the front for Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe.
Vlasov made it on shortly after the downhill started with 600 meters to go and immediately attacked from the back. Bernal closed it down but Vlasov kept going and formed a lead out for Pellizzari. Pellizzari only opened his sprint about 125 meters from the line. He had the most pop still left in the legs of anyone else in the group and came across the line as the victor. Arensman was behind in second but the ride of the day was surely from Gaffuri who took third after being in the early break. The main chase group containing Storer finished 19 seconds down with Ben O'Connor in a small group a further 6 seconds adrift.
The GC is starting to take shape with Pellizzari, Arensman, and Gaffuri in the top three positions, only separated by the bonus seconds at the finish with the other GC contenders, more or less, in the position they finished on the stage.