Climber’s feast WorldTour stage race Volta a Catalunya kicked off on Monday, with one of the favourites, Remco Evenepoel, edged out of the win by Ineos’ hot French sprinter Dorian Godon. The French champion recently claimed the penultimate stage of the Paris-Nice. Tom Pidcock was third. Derek Gee-West was top Canadian in 91st.
Preliminaries
Last year’s edition was a humdinger of a duel between Juan Ayuso and Primož Roglič, the Slovenian taking the title on the last day in Barcelona. Neither chap returned, but Jonas Vingegaard, Evenepoel, Derek Gee-West, Felix Gall, Oscar Onley and João Almeida were ready for a battle royale in Northeastern Spain. Fourteen percent of the starters had also raced Paris-Nice.
Michael Leonard, Pier-André Côté and Riley Pickrell joined Gee-West in the Canadian contingent.
The Course
Monday’s opening round was expectedly hilly, with a Cat. 1 in the middle of the course and many lumps in the final 35 km, including a short rise to the finish line in Sant Feliu de Guíxols. It was a windy day.
There were early KOM points to elicit a breakaway, and five riders mostly representing Spanish ProTeams bounded away. Cat. 1 Alt de Sant Hilari was more notable for its length than its grade. Baptiste Veistroffer, who was first to the top of the opening climb Alt de Romanyà, also took maximum KOM points on Sant Hilari to become the mountains classification leader of the 105th edition.
The ripples in the stage’s final quarter took their toll on the breakaway. The whittled-down peloton caught the final fugitive with 11 km to go. UAE-Emirates powered the bunch. Bahrain-Victorious took the race by the scruff of the neck. Vingegaard went to the front as the frenetic pace continued. It was going to be a reduced-bunch punch up.
Alpecin-Premier Tech led under the red kite. With 400 metres to go Tom Pidcock opened up the sprint. Evenepoel came around him. Godon grabbed the Belgian’s wheel and went hard on his right side and held off celebrating.
Tuesday’s stage is another lumpy one.
2026 Volta a Catalunya
1) Dorian Godon (France/Ineos) 4:01:09
2) Remco Evenepoel (Belgium/Red Bull) s.t.
3) Tom Pidcock (Great Britain/Pinarello-Q36.5) s.t.
91) Derek Gee-West (Canada/Lidl-Trek) +1:48
100) Michael Leonard (Canada/EF Education-Easypost) +2:16