May 26, 2026
After the third and final rest day, the riders are set to start the final week with a stage entirely in the Swiss Canton of Ticino with the shortest road stage in twelve years at just 113 km. While Jonas Vingegaard has firm control in the Mountains classification, none of the other jersey's have as much clarity into their final destinations, but the third week of a Grand Tour is telling and all will be revealed in the coming days. Today's sixteenth stage should be referred to as Tre Valli, although not of Verisine. The start in the town of Bellinzano is situated in the Ticino Valley and immediately heads into the Blenio Valley to begin the day's climbing. Following the Brenno River, the riders will ride upstream to Roccabella and the entrance to a circuit which will be ridden twice. On each lap is the 4.7 km, 5.6% climb to Torre with the ascent of Leontica starting 8 km later. Leontica is shorter at just 3 km but it averages 8% and is full of hairpins on the way up and down. Once out of the circuit with 42 km remaining, the riders will sweep into the Leventina Valley, going against the Ticino River, up to Faido for the Redbull Sprint and the summit finish to Carì. The final climb is 11.6 km at 8%. Adam Yates won here last in the Tour de Suisse in 2024 but the time gaps were not as big as they likely will be today.
Race Summary
There was no hesitation when the flag dropped and the attacking started straight away. A group of eleven broke clear that consisted of Manuele Tarozzi of Bardiani CSF 7 Saber, Johan Jacobs of Groupama-FDJ United, Simone Gualdi of Lotto Intermarché, Markel Beloki of EF-Education EasyPost, Tim Torn Teutenberg of Lidl-Trek, Nelson Oliveira of Movistar, Chris Juul Jensen of Jayco AlUla, Diego Ulissi of XDS-Astana, António Morgado of UAE-XRG, Frank van den Broek of Picnic-PostNL Raisin, and Ludovico Crescioli of Polti-VisitMalta. Nearly everyone was content with the situation except for Lidl-Trek and UAE-XRG. The German squad sat on the front and kept the group at 30 seconds. They got help from UAE-XRG and the gap fluctuated between 25 and 30 seconds as they continued towards the first passage of the Torre. As the riders passed through Serravalle, water from melting glaciers streamed down waterfalls from the mountain tops in temperatures pushing over 32C (91F).
About 4 km from the base of Torre, the chase stalled but the gap was just 25 seconds and Igor Arrieta of UAE-XRG decided to try and jump across to the break. Lidl-Trek put in a big shift which brough Arrieta back but also split about 30 riders off the front of the peloton. By the base of Torre in Aquarossa, most of the 30 riders had joined the front group but the peloton was just a handful of seconds behind and the race was reset. The formation of a new break was still in process by the top with 80.5 km to go as Giulio Ciccone of Lidl-Trek went forward to take maximum points in the Mountains classification.
Twelve riders came across to Ciccone on the gradual downhill including Ulissi and van den Broek again along with Jardi Van Der Lee of EF-Education EasyPost, Joshua Kench of Groupama-FDJ United, Einer Rubio and Juan Pedro López of Movistar, Chris Harper of Pinarello Q36.5, Filippo Zana of Soudal Quickstep, Alan Hatherly of Jayco AlUla, Alessandro Tonelli of Polti-VisitMalta, and Jan Christen and Jhonatan Narváez of UAE-XRG. Visma-Lease a Bike immediately took up the pace setting in the peloton and had the leaders at just 35 seconds by the start of the climb to Leontica. Ciccone was dominant in the sprint at the top to take maximum points again over Rubio as they crested with 69 km remaining and 55 seconds on the peloton.
The sprint for the points atop Leontica caused a split in the lead group. Ciccone was joined by Harper and Narváez on the downhill and by the start of the final ascent to Torre, the chase group of Van Der Lee, Ulissi, Rubio, Zana, and van den Broek were sitting about 15 seconds back. Only Ulissi and Rubio were strong enough to bridge the gap to make five in the lead by the top of Torre. As hard as the lead group was riding, they only had 90 seconds as Ciccone went unchallenged for the points at the top. The pattern continued up the Leontica for the final time with Ciccone taking maximum points from Rubio to start the descent down to the intermediate sprint in Ludiano. With his haul of Mountains points, Ciccone moved to second place with 129 points, 32 behind Vingegaard with just the points on the summit finish to Carì remaining.
Ulissi was a casualty of the sprint at the top of Leontica but the other four pressed on and railed the descent. They had exactly 2 minutes at the sprint with 38 km but a long valley road awaited which would make holding a gap difficult for just four riders. The break was dealt another blow when Decathlon CMA CGM contributed to the chase. With 20 km remaining, the gap was down to 1 minute 15 seconds and the writing was on the wall. Ciccone was visibly frustrated by the situation and just sat up with 17 km remaining. Rubio's efforts were also waning so Harper jumped clear with 13 km to go and picked up the cash and 6 bonus seconds in the Redbull Sprint.
Harper started the climb to Carì with a 47 second advantage to the peloton. Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe lit up the pace when the peloton reached the bottom of the climb which immediately sent any passengers out the back. One of the first to go backwards was their own man, Giulio Pellizzari. They came off the front in a bizarre series of events and were forced to go back to pick up their co-leader. Visma-Lease a Bike took up the charge when Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe disappeared and continued to do damage. Harper was caught with 9.5 km from the top as Afonso Eulálio of Bahrain Victorious and Ben O'Connor of Jayco AlUla, second and eighth in GC, were distanced. With 7 km remaining, the front of the race was down to Davide Piganzoli setting an infernal pace for Jonas Vingegaard with Felix Gall of Decathlon CMA CGM, Egan Bernal and Thymen Arensman of Netcompany-Ineos, Jai Hindley of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe, Derek Gee of Lidl-Trek, and Michael Storer of Tudor Pro Cycling sitting behind.
Piganzoli pulled off with 6.6 km to go and only Gall responded to Vingegaard's attack. The Austrian climber lasted about 100 meters before settling into his rhythm and letting Vingegaard go. At 5 km to go, a chase group had formed with Gall, Bernal, Arensman, Gee, Hindley, and Piganzoli but they had drifted to 45 seconds. Bernal tried to limit the loses for Arensman by riding on the front but the gap kept growing and was out to 1 minute 15 seconds with 2 km to the top. Arensman accelerated away from the group at this point which shed everyone but Gall and Hindley. Under 1 km to go, they started to look at each which allowed Gee to come back and it was clear that the focus for everyone in the group had shifted to the podium spot, knowing the Maglia Rose was out of reach. By the time Vingegaard crossed the line for his fourth mountain top victory, the chasers were 80 seconds behind. Gall sprang clear with 250 meters to go to second place, ultimately finishing 1 minute 9 seconds down with Hindley in third a further 2 seconds adrift.
If there was any question over the Maglia Rose this morning, it was certainly cleared up. Vingegaard now holds a commanding 4 minute 3 second lead to Gall. Arensman rode well and moved to third at 4 minutes 27 seconds with Hindley in fourth at 5 minutes even.