July 5, 2026
With one stage under their belts, the jitters should be gone and the race can get into its rhythm. While today may end in a sprint, it certainly will not be a full bunch sprint. After the riders set off from Tarragona, home of some of the most expansive Roman ruins outside of Italy, the peloton will head North along the Costa Daurada for around 80 almost entirely flat kilometers. Once in Castelldefels however, the race gets complicated for many. There is a turn inland for an intermediate sprint in Viladecans before the road rises up the Coll de Begues for 6.3 km at an average of 5.9%. There are 15 km up on the plateau before the descent down to the Llobregat river and Molins de Rei. Tension will build over the next 15 km into the city streets of Barcelona towards the entrance to the finish circuit in the Parc de Montjuïc. There are three laps, each with a 1.6 km, 9% wall followed by the same 700 meter ramp from yesterday's TTT up to the finish line outside the Olympic Stadium after 168 km. The finale is very similar to Stage 2 last year when only 25 riders came to the line in Boulogne-sur-Mer and the top four were Tadej Pogačar, Mathieu van der Poel, Jonas Vingegaard, and Romain Grégoire. We can expect a very similar outcome.
Race Summary
The dignitaries had their collared shirts unbuttoned and were turning pink in the sun at the sign-on due to the heat and intense sun. Crowds were huge through the neutral zone as kilometer after kilometer went by with flags, waiving hands, and smiling faces on both sides of the road. Once out of town, the flag dropped for the start of the first road stage with beautiful turquoise blue water over the rider's right shoulders. It looked like there was a lot of interest in going up the road but once German Champion Felix Engelhardt of Jayco AlUla, Alex Molenaar of Caja Rural-Seguros RGA, and Frank van den Broek of Picnic-PostNL Raisin got a gap, the bunch shut down and three went away. Right as the bunch was settling, there was a touch of wheels near the front of the peloton and at least ten riders went down. Robbie Dhondt of Picnic-PostNL Raisin looked worst off but everyone was able to get back on and rolling. Some of the other riders down were Aaron Gate, Jenthe Biermans, Biniam Girmay, Dorian Godon, Maxim Van Gils, and Anthon Charmig.
When the gap got to 20 seconds, attacking kicked off again when a Netcompany-Ineos rider tried to break free but he was followed by the entire peloton. In the end, only Baptiste Veistroffer of Lotto Intermarché was able to break away before the bunch shut down for good. Veistroffer had 30 seconds to close on the three leaders but with 134 km to go, he could not cross the gap and gave up and went back into to the peloton. At this point, the bunch had formed a chase under the impetus of Pinarello Q36.5 at 3 minutes 45 seconds behind the three leaders.
The race passed through Sitges with 114 km to go and turned onto a stunning coastal road. The road twisted around the rocky head lands with little dips up and down and marinas periodically dotted along the way. Further up the coast in Castelldefels with 95 km to go, the hills retreated inland and the terrain flattened to make way for beaches, seaside promenades, and restaurants. The gap was down to 2 minutes 30 seconds with 86 km to go and Pinarello Q36.5 were getting some company at the front of the bunch. Teams with sprint interests like Lidl-Trek, Uno-X Mobility, and NSN Cycling were moving forward to position for the intermediate sprint in Viladecans. Interestingly, the riders in the break went for the sprint instead of just keeping their pace and it was Molenaar who took the top prize. Behind, Alpecin-Premier Tech and Soudal Quickstep were getting involved in the lead out but it was Mads Pedersen of Lidl-Trek who jumped for the line first. Girmay was on the Dane's wheel and popped out of the slip stream in the last 50 meters to take the fields sprint for fourth.
Pinarello Q36.5 were quick to restore order and benefited from the sprint surge. The break turned left away from the coast and immediately started to climb up the Coll de Begues with just a 1 minute 40 second advantage. UAE-XRG took over the pace on the climb and, by the top, the gap was down to 30 seconds. In the fight for the KOM points, just as van den Broek was able to start his sprint, he seemed to cramp and there was no chance at getting a run on Molenaar who handily took the points at the top with 74 km to go. Van den Broek filtered back into the peloton while Molenaar and Engelhardt continued on to start the pedaling descent towards Olesa de Bonesvalls.
Once in Molins de Rei with 47 km to go, the bunch organized in team trains on the wide industrial roads leading into Barcelona. After the teams settled into color order, the speed picked up to position for upcoming road furniture and a turn onto more narrow roads. There were a number of flat tires, particularly from Decathlon CMA CGM with both Olav Kooij and Paul Seixas needing assistance. It was untl 31 km to go at the entrance of the circuit that Seixas finally made it back into the safety of the peloton simply due to the positioning race by the teams on the front.
At the bottom of the first passage up Montjuïc, UAE-XRG set the pace with EF-Education EasyPost, Groupama-FDJ United, and Visma-Lease a Bike sitting on their flanks. Brandon McNulty led the peloton up to the top through an unbelievable amount of fans behind the barriers with a spectacular view overlooking Barcelona in the distance. There were no attacks but riders were getting dropped in handfuls at a time only about 50 riders remained in contact.
McNulty led through the finish line and back around the circuit to the climb again with 16 km remaining. The American was on a stellar day and carried the bunch over the top completely on his own but the damage wasn't as severe as the first time around and around 40 riders were still in contention.
The last bottles were taken through the feed zone and dumped over heads to cool down before the final intense effort to the finish. As empty bottles were jettisoned into the crowd, McNulty took his last pull and gave way to Uno-X Mobility with 5.5 km to go. The next 1,500 meters were cagey with few teammates of the leaders present to keep the group rolling quickly. There was a lot of looking around until Decathlon CMA CGM grabbed the reins to lead into the base of penultimate rise of the day. Tiesj Benoot took the group half way up and passed the baton to Adam Yates of UAE-XRG. With 700 meters still to climb, the group was halved and only the top GC riders and few of their teammates were still present. 100 meters from the top, Tobias Johannessen of Uno-X Mobility accelerated with Richard Carapaz of EF-Education EasyPost glued to his wheel. Tadej Pogačar of UAE-XRG slotted into third wheel but there was no gap and about 15 riders were connected to start the downhill with just 2 km to go.
Mattias Skjelmose of Lidl-Trek led on the descent but it was Isaac del Toro of UAE-XRG who was quickest through the final corner at 700 meters to go and ripped the pace going into the final rise. Race leader Jonas Vingegaard of Visma-Lease a Bike was in second wheel with Pogačar in third with a small gap back to Skjelmose and the rest of the favorites. Del Toro continued driving on the front and made a small gap on Vingegaard. It opened to a few bike lengths and Pogačar had a decision to make. Should he attack and try to put some seconds into Vingegaard or allow del Toro to stay away for the stage win? Pogačar chose the latter and came around Vingegaard only when he had to in the last 100 meters. The Slovenian came up to del Toro with a little gap back to Vingegaard and the UAE-XRG pair crossed the line one-two with del Toro taking top honors. Vingegaard was pipped by Remco Evenepoel of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe for third on the day which took away all of the bonus seconds for Vingegaard at the finish.
The stage ended up being way more attritional than originally expected. Pogačar moved to second in GC just 6 seconds down on Vingegaard with Evenepoel now in third at 15 seconds. Most of the GC hopefuls finished within 10 seconds but the warning shots have been fired and markers were set down for the hierarchy of this Tour.