Favorites general classification Vuelta a España 2025 | Vingegaard faces fresh challengers for the red jersey after a grueling Tour

Like the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France, the Vuelta has its own distinctive traits. It’s almost always hotter than the other two, the route often features brutally steep climbs, there are more summit finishes than anywhere else, and relatively few riders circle it as their ultimate goal for the season. Primoz Roglic, for example, has won the race four times in the last six years, often after a disappointing Tour de France. He’d arrive in Spain half-injured and still come out on top.

Or take Sepp Kuss, who in 2023 rode all three grand tours: he won the Giro alongside Roglic, the Tour alongside Jonas Vingegaard, and when it looked like those two would fight for the Vuelta title in the final week, they handed the win to the super-strong American. Remco Evenepoel was the last rider to win the Vuelta as a clear season goal, in 2022, which remains his only grand tour victory so far. Before the Roglic era, we saw a similar scenario with Simon Yates.

Quite often, riders have carried Tour de France form into the Vuelta and thrived thanks to supercompensation. Chris Froome did it in 2017, winning both the Tour and the Vuelta in the same year. Could Jonas Vingegaard pull off the same feat? Could the Dane have used the Tour to warm up his legs before emptying the tank over three weeks in Spain to win the GC? In 2023, he famously gifted the victory to Kuss, and in 2020 he rode in service of Roglic. With Tadej Pogacar absent, that makes him the man to beat… right? Right!?

Also check out the other favorites by IDLProCycling.com:
- Preview La Vuelta a España 2025
- Favorites points classification (coming soon)
- Favorites mountain classification (coming soon)
- Favorites young rider classification (coming soon)
- Fantasy league tips for La Vuelta a España 2025 (coming soon)

2024 Primoz Roglic
2023 Sepp Kuss
2022 Remco Evenepoel
2021 Primoz Roglic
2020 Primoz Roglic
2019 Primoz Roglic
2018 Simon Yates
2017 Chris Froome
2016 Nairo Quintana
2015 Fabio Aru

To compile this list, (former) editors at IDLProCycling.com were asked for their top ten in response to the question: "Who is most likely to win the Vuelta a España 2025?" Each top ten was assigned points: 12 points for first place, 10 for second place, and then 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1 point, respectively.

Few riders have raced as little in 2025 (without injury) as Derek Gee. The 28-year-old Canadian has good reason for that, since last winter, he’s been on a major mission to reinvent himself as a GC rider. Once a strong breakaway specialist who could accidentally land high in stage races, Gee has built this entire season around delivering in two grand tours. Ahead of the Giro d’Italia, his only race days came at O Gran Camiño (which he won), Tirreno–Adriatico (fourth overall), and the Tour of the Alps (third overall), before finishing an impressive fourth in May’s Giro.

After losing significant time in the opening week, Gee steadily rode himself into the race and was “best of the rest” behind the podium trio in week three. Post-Giro, his only appearance was winning the Canadian national title in June, then he disappeared from competition again to prepare for his second big goal of the year. If Gee can limit his losses in the first week, despite having no recent race rhythm, he’ll be a dangerous contender. He rarely has a truly bad day, which could make a big difference in the season’s final grand tour.

Last winter in Mallorca, Primoz Roglic was penciled in as Red Bull–BORA–hansgrohe’s leader for the Giro and Tour, with Jai Hindley earmarked for the Vuelta. But cycling never follows the script. In the Tour, Florian Lipowitz broke through as a GC talent, taking a superb third place overall in Paris. In May, Giulio Pellizzari produced a similar revelation, finishing sixth in the Giro despite losing huge amounts of time while working for Roglic. Without those early sacrifices, he could have finished much higher.

In the Vuelta, Pellizzari is not expected to ride purely in service of Hindley. The Australian crashed hard in the Giro and fractured a vertebra, leaving major doubts about his GC ambitions for Spain. That could open the door for Pellizzari to “do a Lipowitz” in the Vuelta, and maybe even better. The way he climbed in the third week of the Giro was staggering. With those numbers, he could be the race’s big surprise. The magic legs weren’t quite there yet at the Vuelta a Burgos, but then again, we won't reach Madrid until September 14.

If we were still in 2021, Egan Bernal would be a guaranteed top-three pick for this list, but we’re now four years and a career-changing crash down the road. The still-only 28-year-old Colombian deserves immense respect for the level he’s reached since that horrific training accident in 2022, when he slammed into a stationary bus at 70 km/h. By his own account, he’s even better than before, but the peloton has also raised its game, making it far harder to win like he did in his peak years.

However, Bernal feels he’s been given a second chance at life, and he’s determined to make the seemingly impossible possible. In the Giro, he came up just short against the very best over three weeks, finishing seventh overall. Afterward, he returned to South America for the kind of intense training block only he can do, hoping to be stronger for the Vuelta. Should he win, Bernal would complete his set of overall victories in all three grand yours, and there’s not a soul in the sport who wouldn’t be happy to see it happen.

Then there’s Mikel Landa, suddenly the undisputed leader of The Wolfpack. The 35-year-old Spaniard spent years searching for a GC leadership role, only to consciously choose a luxury domestique position for Remco Evenepoel. But when Evenepoel opted to focus on the September and October championships, Landa was thrust into sole leadership for the Vuelta. And honestly, we’re excited about it, because a fully fit Landa still belongs among the world’s best.

“Landismo”, the now-familiar concept where a peak-form Landa always seems to run into trouble, was in full force at the Giro, when he crashed out on day one after overshooting a corner. He recovered from a fractured vertebra and quietly built toward his home grand tour. Like Pellizzari, he wasn’t at his best in Burgos, but peaking at the right time is something Landa has mastered. Strangely, he’s never made the podium in the Vuelta, but there’s a first time for everything. And maybe, just maybe, that first time will be the top step...

Then there are some riders you barely notice for three weeks, yet they still end up high in the GC. Antonio Tiberi is one of them, fifth in the 2024 Giro d’Italia, and this year on track for an even better result until a crash while sitting third overall wiped it all away. Like last year, Tiberi is opting for the Giro-Vuelta double with Bahrain Victorious, and although he gave up last year due to sunstroke, everything seems to be in place for a score now. In his own anonymous way, Tiberi finished second in the Tour of Poland, proving he has the fitness.

With his trademark grimaces and passive following style, Tiberi has a tailor-made Vuelta route ahead of him, featuring plenty of climbing and an individual time trial. He’ll dig into the wheels of the favorites and they'll have to be at their best to drop him. At just 24, the Italian rarely fights for stage wins, but maybe that will change after all, you don’t win the Vuelta by following in the wheel alone. On those brutally steep climbs, he may need to launch moves of his own. And if he does, we might just get to know an even better Tiberi.

That makes three Italians on this list, a luxury for a country that’s long complained about its lack of GC riders. Alongside the young Pellizzari and the savvy Tiberi, Giulio Ciccone will also take the start. The 30-year-old from Abruzzo spent years as a pure attacker, targeting mountain stages or the KOM jersey. He’s already won the polka dots in the 2019 Giro and the 2023 Tour, has three Giro stage wins to his name, and has also taken stages in Catalonia, the Dauphiné, and the Tour of the Alps.

But at Lidl–Trek, Ciccone has evolved into a rider capable of much more than just attacking. In this year’s Giro, he was well on his way to a first grand tour top ten, and the team believes that without his crash on stage 14, he could have won the whole race. Now, the Vuelta is his chance to prove it. He’s climbing better than ever, has already won the Clásica San Sebastián and a stage at the Vuelta a Burgos this month, and has improved his time trial. With Lidl–Trek bringing a strong support squad, if Ciccone stays upright, Italy can start dreaming.

In ten years’ time, there will probably be documentaries and books made about the finale of the 2025 Giro d’Italia. Simon Yates turned the race on its head to win, but the real headline was the legendary feud between Isaac Del Toro and Richard Carapaz. The wily Ecuadorian from EF Education–EasyPost effectively cost Del Toro the Giro, settling for third place himself. Quietly, it was already his fifth career grand tour podium, and considering how close he came, pink might well have been his. Just as in 2019, when he surprised everyone by winning the Giro.

From that year onward, Carapaz became a full-fledged GC man: second in the 2020 Vuelta, third in the 2021 Tour, second in the 2022 Giro, and now third again in Italy this May. When the GC hasn’t worked out, he’s turned to stage wins and the mountains classification. In 2022, he won three stages and took the KOM jersey; in 2024, a single stage win was enough for the polka dots at the Tour. For the Vuelta, his focus is back on the GC, having not raced since the Giro. He skipped the Tour with a gastrointestinal infection, giving him ample time to build those “magic legs” for Spain.

Speaking of hungry riders… Juan Ayuso’s grinta will be pouring out of him after what has been, to put it mildly, a turbulent year. The 22-year-old Spaniard had a phenomenal winter with a completely new approach, leading to spring victories at the Faun Drôme Classic, Trofeo Laigueglia, and Tirreno–Adriatico (stage and overall). After more success in Catalonia (stage win and second overall) and a high-altitude camp, he set his sights on the Giro in May, but crashed on stage 9, then was stung by a wasp on stage 17. Despite winning stage 7, he was forced to abandon.

After the Giro, the debate flared up again over Ayuso’s attitude, accusations that he hadn’t worked for Del Toro’s pink jersey, echoing the criticism from a year earlier when he was accused of not helping Tadej Pogacar in the Tour. Even with a contract running through 2028, rumors swirled about a possible departure, and he wasn’t even slated to ride the Vuelta. But with Pogacar taking a rest, Ayuso gets the nod and with all that baggage, we’re eager to see how good he’ll be on home roads. Third and fourth in the Vuelta in 2022 and 2023… could this be the year he makes a statement with the overall win?

If Ayuso wants to win the Vuelta, he’ll have to deal not only with the number one on this list, but also competition from inside his own team. UAE Team Emirates–XRG is also lining up João Almeida for Spain. The 27-year-old Portuguese crashed out of the Tour with broken ribs, giving him time to recover and rebuild top form for the Vuelta. Initially slated as a domestique for Pogacar, Almeida now gets the chance to ride for himself, and with good reason. 2025 has without doubt been his best season yet, with a stage win in Paris–Nice, stage and overall victory in the Basque Country, the overall in Romandie, and no less than three stage wins plus the GC in the Tour of Switzerland.

Quietly, Almeida had already been mentioned alongside Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard as one of the Tour de France favorites. Now that the Tour didn’t happen for him, expectations are sky-high for the Vuelta. Almeida is no longer just a wheel follower, in 2025, he’s been riding with surplus and isn’t afraid to attack. His time trials remain top-level, but his climbing has gone up a notch as well. That makes him without doubt Vingegaard’s biggest challenger, especially if his working relationship with Ayuso runs smoothly. And that’s still a question mark, as the two don’t seem to be the best of friends.

No new Tadej vs. Jonas duel this time, but that might make this Vuelta even more exciting. Since his crash at the 2024 Tour of the Basque Country, Vingegaard hasn’t looked quite as untouchable. He claimed to be better than ever at the Tour, but Pogacar’s relentless pace made it hard to tell. That’s why Spain will be fascinating, to see what kind of legs Vingegaard will bring. In 2023, he proved he could handle the Tour–Vuelta double, even gifting the overall to teammate Sepp Kuss.

This time, it’s all for him at Visma | Lease a Bike. While Pogacar has said he’s running on empty after the Tour, Vingegaard has hinted there’s still something left in the tank. If we see the same rider who won the Tours of 2022 and 2023, this could turn into a one-sided race, especially with both a team time trial and an individual time trial in the route. But even if it does become a one-man show, it will be a joy to watch, because that would mean the full return of Jonas Vingegaard in peak form.

Bram van der Ploeg ( Twitter: @BvdPloegg | email : [email protected])