May 27, 2026
There is a phrase that says "The whole is greater than the sum of it's parts" and that has never been more true on a stage profile than today. Nothing on the profile really jumps out as overly challenging, but by the time the riders reach Andalo after 202 km, they will have gained nearly 3,300 meters of elevation. The first 55 km from the start in Cassano d'Adda, on the outskirts of Milan, is completely flat. The route runs in a North Easterly direction to the bottom of Lago d'Iseo and the Passo dei Tre Termini. The Termini is probably the hardest climb of the day at 8.2 km with average gradient of just under 6%. The 8.2 km, 4.1% Cocca di Lodrino quickly follows before turning into the Sabbia Valley for a 38 km false flat uphill, running against the Chiese River. Rudely, there is an intermediate sprint atop Roncone, a 5 km climb at 5%. After the descent into Tione di Trento, the next 40 km all roll uphill, through the Redbull Sprint at 15 km to go, to Andalo-Lever. There is a fast 5 km downhill before the final 2.5 km rise and a flat 1,500 meters to the finish in Andalo proper. The stage has break away written all over it but the GC riders will have to be careful because it also has the potential for an ambush if teams run out of resources early.
Race Summary
The heat dome that has been plaguing Northern Europe continued to hold firm which sent the temperatures into the low-mid 30's (~93F). When the flag dropped, Johan Jacobs of Groupama-FDJ United, Madis Mihkels of EF-Education EasyPost, and Robin Froidevaux of Tudor Pro Cycling went quickly off the front and dangled between 20-30 seconds as more riders were trying to break free. The incessant attacking brought the three leaders back with 180 km to go and it all started again. About 10 km later, seven riders found themselves off the front. The group consisted of Andreas Leknessund of Uno-X Mobility, Alessandro Tonelli of Polti-VisitMalta, Jan Christen of UAE-XRG, Michael Valgren of EF-Education EasyPost, Manuele Tarozzi of Bardiani CSF 7 Saber, Rémi Cavagna of Groupama-FDJ United, and Niklas Larsen of Unibet Rose Rockets. The gap grew to 25 seconds and Visma-Lease a Bike tried to block to allow the group to gain an advantage but that was futile with so many teams still wanting to be involved.
The seven leaders reached the banks of the Lago d'Iseo with 155 km to go with just a 16 second lead on Tobias Bayer of Alpecin-Premier Tech and 40 seconds on the rest of the peloton. Six more riders got away before the composition was right and the peloton went wide and shut down. The riders in the secondary attack were Lorenzo Milesi of Movistar, Sean Flynn and Frank van den Broek of Picnic-PostNL Raisin, Mattia Bais of Polti-VisitMalta, Mick Van Dijke of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe, and Tomáš Kopecký of Unibet Rose Rockets. When the front group arrived at the base of the Passo dei Tre Termini with 146 km remaining, they had 1 minute 5 seconds on the chase group, which had picked up Bayer, and 2 minutes 20 seconds on the peloton.
When the peloton got to the Tre Termini, attacks kicked off once again by the climber types but they had a 2 minute gap to cross. Florian Stork of Tudor Pro Cycling was the first to go but more were following behind. At the top, the lead group of seven were joined by Van Dijke, Milesi, Bais, and van den Broek but there was another group of at least 15 riders behind that had split off the peloton and were on their way across. The some of the characters in the larger chase were Stork, Damiano Caruso of Bahrain Victorious, Jardi Van Der Lee of EF-Education EasyPost, Giulio Ciccone of Lidl-Trek, the Movistar trio of Enric Mas, Einer Rubio, and Juan Pedro López, Jan Hirt of NSN Cycling, David de la Cruz and Mark Donovan of Pinarello Q36.5, Aleksandr Vlasov of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe, Gianmarco Garofoli of Soudal Quickstep, and Jhonatan Narváez and Igor Arrieta of UAE-XRG.
At the start of the Cocca di Lodrino with 122 km to go, the chasers were struggling to make progress on the leaders. They seemed to be stuck at 55 seconds but were able to jump across the gap and make contact about 2 km from the top. When it was looking like the group would swell, Cavagna attacked the lead group and was off the front of the race alone. The daring Frenchman took the mountains points at the top and carried on with a 50 second lead on the 28 chasers and nearly 4 minutes 30 seconds on the peloton.
Cavagna put his head down and committed to the move. As he made his way up the Chiese River valley with 100 km to go, he had built a 2 minute lead on a chase that looked disorganized and confused. 20 km down the road, Cavagna was out to 2 minutes 30 seconds as black clouds billowed ahead and threats of thunder storms became more imminent. When Cavagna hit the rain with 72 km to go, UAE-XRG had the chase rolling a bit more smoothly which brought the gap down to 2 minutes to the TGV of Clermont-Ferrand.
The gap continued to drop on the uncategorized climb to the intermediate sprint in Roncone. De la Cruz made the first move 3 km from the sprint which really ignited the group. UAE-XRG lit up the pace with Christen and Arrieta who brought both de la Cruz and Cavagna back just 300 meters from the intermediate sprint, setting Narváez up perfectly to take more points for the Maglia Ciclamino. Narváez accelerated to take the points, moving him ahead of Paul Magnier by 10 points, but the move was strong enough to create distance to the rest of the break. Ciccone was wise to it and was straight on the wheel. Fabio Van den Bossche of Soudal Quickstep also made the connection but the cohesion was poor at best and the chase group came back together with 56 km to go.
The race changed phases on the rolling roads towards Tione di Trento as riders tried to force a fuga della fuga. Caruso attacked with 45 km remaining and brought with him Valgren, Garofili, and J.P López. Leknessund bridged up a few kilometers later and it was desperation for the others to get across before the train left the station. Riders were split into four or five groups and the situation was constantly changing. Rubio, Vlasov, and Arrieta made contact to make eight at the front of the race with 30 km remaining and still around 15 km uphill to the Redbull Sprint. 1 km later, de la Cruz and Van Dijke joined but there was only 30 seconds separating them from the Ciccone/Narváez group who were getting organized behind.
The road got a bit steeper 3 km from the Redbull Sprint in Andalo-Lever and Caruso tried to split the group again. There were a number of blows and counter blows and the first one to get a gap was from Rubio. Valgren and Arrieta came across and had about 10 seconds on the Caruso-led chase group by the Redbull Sprint with 15 remaining. The trio started playing and Rubio decided to go again. Valgren was able to follow but Arrieta didn't have the legs which left two at the front. By the top of Andalo-Lever, Valgren and Rubio had just 10 seconds on Leknessund, Arrieta, Caruso, and Vlasov with everyone else from the original break out of the game.
The gap ticked out to 15 seconds through 4 km to go when the road went uphill for the final time. Rubio set a hard pace and Valgren was gritting his teeth to stay connected. With 3 km to go, Arrieta sprang from the chase group and got within 5 seconds of Rubio and Valgren. Rubio attacked a few hundred meters later but Valgren had the answer and the gap to Arrieta stretched out a few seconds. When Rubio realized he couldn't shake Valgren, he sat up and Valgren did not pull through. Arrieta kept at his pace and was finally able to bridge up to make the winning calculus even more complicated for Rubio.
Inside 2 km, neither Rubio or Arrieta pulled which allowed Vlasov, Leknessund, and Caruso back in with a chance. Caruso hit the group almost immediately but Rubio matched and the others followed. The gradients for the likes of Rubio were running out as they approached the final flat 1,200 meters. The group spread wide and nearly stopped when Valgren came with speed from last wheel. There was no initial reaction and the Dane flew the coop. Leknessund was next to go and tried to come across but he ran out of road and had to settle for second place for the third time. Valgren held up a charm given to him by his son as he crossed the line for his first Grand Tour stage win. Caruso took the sprint for third, a close call for the 38 year old who is riding his final Giro.
The GC remained almost unchanged with the exception of Caruso who moved into ninth overall, courtesy of the time gained from being in the winning break.