He leads a Basque round to which Enric Mas, Landa, Bilbao, Gaudu, Carapaz and Carlos Rodríguez have also signed up
Itzulia arrives with its usual leg-breaking terrain, without large ports but with a constant up and down
Cycling, fortunately, is non-stop, like the wheels of the bikes that go round and round going up passes and looking for a goal. At Easter, not only is the closed-for-holidays sign not hung, but the best runners, spread out as is happening this spring, They meet on Basque roads, to contest the Itzulia from Monday to Saturday, the correct denomination with which the Tour of the Basque Country must now be cited.
As is also traditional The race is distinguished neither by the high mountains, nor by flat roads without sparkle, but by a broken route that squeezes the cyclists like an orange from which the juice is squeezed.
Six days, perhaps the first, this Monday in Labastida, in the Rioja Alavesa, is the only one that is more or less flat, in which you climb the small but complicated ports that a cyclist can find on the Basque and Navarrese roads, and where the figures, led by Jonas Vingegaard, will seek victory in the second World Tour race (the highest category of cycling) that takes place in Spain, just two weeks after finishing the Volta won by a fellow member of the Dane, the Slovenian runner Primoz Roglic.
The truth is that Vingegaard had an outstanding season premiere. He signed up for the O Gran Camiño (the new name for the Galician round) and won all the stages, except the first one because it was canceled due to bad weather.
It was a crushing dominance, though then, in Paris-Nice, he gave in to the push of an intractable Tadej Pogacar. He couldn’t follow him and when he tried, not even a hook helped him to avoid losing contact with the rear wheel of the Slovenian phenomenon. And even the French cyclist David Gaudu, perhaps now the main figure for stage races in the country that created the Tour, he was more brilliant, finishing second, ahead of Vingegaard and behind Pogacar.
Now, Without his great rival in the French round, Vingegaard will have to try to recover his note and, above all, his ability to react to show that he is moving in the right direction for a Tour that will begin not far from where Itzulia runs this week. since the Grande Boucle begins on July 1 in Bilbao.
There, precisely, They have placed a clock in front of the San Mamés stadium that counts down the days and hours until the great cycling event begins every year.
Enric Mas, absent from the Volta, seems like the great rival of the Danish runner, in a season in which the Mallorcan from Movistar has always been at the top of the general standings, like the two main local figures, Mikel Landa and Pello Bilbao, co-leaders in Bahrain as a whole and who have not wanted to lose contact with their roads and their countrymen.
Significant will be the return to activity of Carlos Rodríguez, the pearl of Granada, after falling in the Strada Bianche where he broke his clavicle that prevented him from going to the Volta. In his team, Ineos, is the Colombian Daniel Martínez, who defends last year’s absolute victory.
He will do it against other rivals such as Gaudu, Sergio Higuita (winner of the Volta 2022), Richard Carapaz, Simon and Adam Yates, Ion Izagirre and the Catalan Marc Soler.
The queen stage, starting and finishing in Eibar, will be the last, on a very cycling Holy Saturday. There will also be arrivals in Leitza (Navarra), Villabona (Guipúzcoa), as well as in Santurtzi and Amorebieta. Every day on television through Eurosport, Esport3 and EITB.
