2026 Giro d'Italia Women Race Preview & Stage Profiles
The details of this year's 2026 Giro d'Italia Women are falling into place. Find the stage profiles and maps below, followed by our strategic preview of the race.
The 2026 Giro d'Italia Women breaks with tradition before a wheel turns. RCS Sport has pulled the race forward from its familiar July slot to 30 May–7 June, lining the nine-day Grand Tour up against the closing weekend of the men's Giro. Nine stages, 1,153.7 km and a brutal 12,500 metres of climbing — and almost all of the damage is saved for the back half.
The opening days belong to the fast finishers. Stage 1 around Ravenna and stage 2 into Caorle are pancake-flat sprint fodder, and stage 6 from Ala to Brescello is dead flat too — no categorised climb at all between Ala and Brescello, nothing in the way of the sprinters bar a twisty finale. Lorena Wiebes, Elisa Balsamo and Liane Lippert will trade bunch gallops here, and bonus seconds could hand an early maglia rosa to whoever times the line best.
The GC fight ignites on stage 4. It's a 12.7 km mountain time trial with an 11 km climb averaging 6%, but it's no steady effort — the steepest section rises 4.3 km at 10.4%. Watch the gaps here; they'll frame everything that follows.
Stage 5 is the first true mountain day. Over 146 km and 3,400 metres of climbing from Longarone, the riders tackle the Passo Tre Croci (7.9 km at 7.2%) and the Passo di Sant'Antonio (8.3 km at 7.5%), then a finishing circuit with a 4 km climb at 9.1% twice, before a 9 km descent to the line. The strongest climber won't necessarily ride away alone — descenders and bold tacticians get a say. CyclingStage\nBut this Giro is built around stage 8. After a flat approach, the partly unpaved Colle delle Finestre rises 18.5 km at an average of 9.2% to 2,178 metres, before an 11 km descent and the long, shallow drag to Sestriere (16.2 km at 3.8%). The Finestre's gravel doesn't just sort the contenders, it exposes them — and anyone in trouble there won't claw it back on the run-in. This is the day the pink jersey is most likely won and lost.
Stage 9 around Saluzzo offers one last ambush, with the Montoso (8.9 km at 9.4%) for anyone needing to overturn a deficit before the race closes.
As for the riders: Demi Vollering (FDJ United–Suez) is the favourite for overall victory, with the chief challengers being two-time defending champion Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ), Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx–Protime) and Marlen Reusser (Movistar). Vollering's blend of climbing and time-trialling fits this parcours about as well as any. Longo Borghini chases a third straight title on home roads and is never to be underestimated when the race tilts uphill. Reusser will eye the Nevegal ITT, and Sarah Gigante (AG Insurance–Soudal), who won both mountain stages in 2025, is a pure climber who can fly on the Finestre. With the hardest terrain stacked at the very end, expect this one to stay live until the final weekend.
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