Vuelta a Espana 2025: Vingegaard to dominate Tour of Spain in Pogacar’s absence?
by Devesh Jaganath | by Devesh Jaganath
Visma team primed for big showing at La Vuelta
The 2025 Vuelta a Espana will start in Turin this year, and after an initial run of 186km, the first red leader’s jersey will be up for grabs as the riders reach Novara, where the top sprinters will have their chance to make their first mark on the race.
Heading into the tour, Jonas Vingegaard of Visma-Lease a Bike is the clear favourite for the title, partly due to his second-placed finish at this year’s Tour de France, as well as the extensively spoken about absence of Tadej Pogacar.
Earlier this week, Vingegaard mentioned that he is solely concentrated on La Vuelta and has already made a big call to forego September’s world championship in Rwanda, indicating that this 21-stage trip would leave him too tired to compete at his usual level in Africa.
All the best online betting sites have the Dane currently installed head and shoulders above the rest of the field, but there is also late support coming for the UAE Team Emirates duo of Joao Almeida and Juan Ayuso.
Still, with Pogacar, Remco Evenepoel and Primoz Roglic all missing from the Spanish Tour, Vingegaard is so far above the rest in the pre-race rankings that he is in another zip code. This then seems the perfect opportunity for the Visma man to shed the tag of “underachiever”.
La Vuelta 2025: Stage 1
This year’s Vuelta a Espana gets going from the grand Baroque palace of Venaria and heads through the Po Valley’s flatlands. Indeed, with the category three La Serra being the only categorised climb in this stage, sprinters are expected to shine, as suggested in our Stage 1 - La Vuelta prediction.
Stage 1 sees Jasper Philipsen set off as the market leader after his win in the opening stage of the Tour de France. The Belgian is an elite sprinter and will want to make his mark on the race, while Mads Pedersen is widely expected to be his biggest rival.
Stage 1: Overview
Date: Saturday, 23rd August
Distance: 186km
Start: Turin
Finish: Novara
