Mikel Landa leads the Bahrain Victorious lineup with the 110th edition of the race departing on home roads for the Basque rider. Departing from Bilbao, this year’s edition will have riders take on 3,404 km and over 55,000 vertical meters of climbing across the 21 stages, which only includes a hilly 22km time trial on stage 16.
With only the one time trial, this year’s Tour de France takes the peloton from across the mountains, starting in the Basque Country and the Pyrenees, across to the Alps, Jura and Vosges. With few coastal roads and no cobblestones or dirt roads, it seems a more suited course for the pure climbers.
The 21 stages have been categorised into eight flat stages for the sprinters, which Phil Bauhaus will contest with the support of Nikias Arndt, four hilly stages suited to breakaways, where Fred Wright and Matej Mohoric will look for their opportunities and eight mountain stages where Jack Haig and Wout Poels will support Landa. Pello Bilbao will also keep his eye on the GC and riding home roads for the Grand Depart; he will be highly motivated to aim for another place in the top ten as he did back in 2021.
In contrast to the Giro d’Italia, the Tour de France only has two stages over 200km long. However, there will be shorter intense days where the peloton will take on highly challenging mountainous stages. A big day marked for the GC battle is Stage 17 and this year’s Queen Stage. It has over 5,300 vertical meters across the 166km stage. The peloton will face two Cat-1 climbs before taking on the gruelling Hors Categorie climb, Col de Loze, which is 28.3km long and averages 6%.
With a single time trial, a grand depart in his home country and plenty of climbing, Mikel Landa is looking forward to this edition of the Tour de France: “The depart in the Basque Country is going to be really exciting! I’ve already been feeling the passion and excitement of the fans. They are supporting me already. I think it’s going to be a big celebration of cycling, so I’m really happy to be a part of that.
The key stages start in the Basque country with two hard opening stages, and it will be crucial to be ready, as there could be some gaps already at the finish line.
Looking at my ambitions, I’d love to finish close to the podium in the GC and also look to win a stage, which is also a dream.
This year the team and all of us have been impacted by the loss of our friend and teammate, Gino. We need to look at this for extra motivation and to be at our best every day and try and race for him and honour him.”
Lead Sports director Gorazd Štangelj believes the strong team gives Bahrain Victorious good options across the stages: ” We are coming into this Tour de France with big ambitions, and I believe we have an excellent team to have opportunities across all the stages. We’ve got two highly motivated Basque riders who have the opportunity of racing at a Grand Depart on home roads and a route that suits their style of racing. Landa will be our leader, and Pello will co-lead. We then have Matej and Fred, who can look for their opportunities through breakaways, while Phil will have his chances as there are many stages for the sprinters on paper at this year’s Tour, and he will have a highly experienced lead-out man in Nikias. We then are lucky to have fantastic support in the high mountains with Jack and Wout, and both have the ability to fight for a stage win. Overall, we have a strong lineup, and every rider can take advantage of an opportunity across the stages.”
This year we have had a challenging lead-up with the tragic loss of our dear friend Gino. We want to ride in his memory and dedicate it to him.”
Today and every day, we ride for you, Gino.
#rideforGino
