“It looks like a hard but well balanced parcours. It’s a normal Vuelta in the sense that there are a lot hard mountains, but we already know many of them. To win it, you also need to be strong against the clock, as there are more than 40 kilometers of time trialing. I think the most unusual thing is that there are two stages with more than 5,000 meters of climbing spread out over the entire stage, which is not very common in the Vuelta,” Grischa Niermann, Head of Racing, said after the presentation.

“Other than that, I see a lot of opportunities for fast riders who can also survive some climbs. There are not many completely flat stages. The heat will likely play a role next year too, with the entire race taking place in the South. We will now sit down and make a good plan.”

The fight to succeed Jonas Vingegaard as the winner of the red jersey will kick off with a 9 kilometer flat time trial in Monaco, shortly followed by the first summit finish of the race on stage three. Already the day after, three category 1 climbs in the thin air of Andorra will make for an action packed 104 kilometer long stage 4, before the peloton finally enters Spain on stage 5. The rest of the first week consists of hilly stages, that could be too hard for sprinters but not quite hard enough for the true climbers, before a big final on Alto de Aitana awaits on stage 9.  

The “Gran Salida” in Monaco marks only the seventh time in history that the Vuelta has started outside of Spain, making it quite a special happening. It certainly will be for Steven Kruijswijk, who lives right next to the time trial course on the very first stage.

“It’s rare to have a Grand Tour starting on your doorstep, so it will be very special for me to race on all these roads I’m familiar with. It’s really a big thing to experience. Overall, the Vuelta is a race I like, it always suited me as a climber, and it’s a bit less stressful than especially the Tour. I hope to be on the start line in August,” Kruijswijk says.

The second week moves into the heart of Andalusia in the South of Spain, where the temperatures can be high during August and September. A few chances for the fastest men in the bunch look to be on the menu, but in typical Vuelta fashion, no one escapes the brutal mountain finishes for too long, as Calar Alto and the steep Sierra de la Pandera also feature during week two.    

The third and final week of the year’s last Grand Tour starts out uncharacteristically flat with two sprint stages and a 32 kilometer time trial along the coast on stage 16, 17 and 18. Peñas Blancas marks the return to the mountain top finishes on stage 19, before what could well be the hardest stage profile of the entire year makes up stage 20. 5.000 meters of climbing might have become normal for a Grand Tour queen stage, but when the majority of those altitude meters are centered on the double ascent of Alto de Hazallanas and Collado del Alguacil (8,3 kilometers with an average gradient of 9,8%), only a rider with very special climbing abilities will be triumphant in Spain. The Vuelta a España 2026 is rounded off by a final stage in the city of Granada with a handful of tough laps to the historical site of Alhambra.

Overall, Kruijswijk agrees with Niermann that it will be another very hard edition of La Vuelta.  

“The course looks very challenging. There’s a lot of climbing already in the first week, but then it just continues like that. I’ve done a few Vueltas in my career, and I know how tough it can be when we get to the South in those months,” the former number four in the Vuelta concludes.