Last-minute tune-up? Giro protagonists explain their choice to take on Frankfurt one week out

Saturday, 02 May 2026 at 09:10

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Exactly one week before the Giro d'Italia gets underway in Bulgaria. A sizeable contingent of riders lined up at Eschborn-Frankfurt hoping for a last mintute tune-up. More riders than last year combined this WorldTour one-day race with the Italian Grand Tour — and the travel schedule is not straightforward. IDL Pro Cycling spoke with some of them at the start in Eschborn.

Frankfurt always draws an eclectic mix. At the start area, just north-west of the city, you could find sprinters and stand-ins like Fabio Jakobsen and Maikel Zijlaard, riders carrying form straight through from the hill Classics into the Taunus climbs, and a handful of others using the race as a final Giro dress rehearsal.

Part of that mix is driven by the increasingly congested calendar. Frankfurt clashes with the Tour de Romandie — which four WorldTeams are missing — and many riders who have been busy since March are taking a breather before building into the summer. But others have made a deliberate choice to keep racing before four weeks away from home — because that is what a Grand Tour now means, between travel, pre-race formalities and the race itself.

"It's always nice to have that race stimulus," confirmed Tobias Lund Andresen (Decathlon CMA CGM), Jake Stewart (NSN) and Ben Turner (INEOS Grenadiers) — all three speaking in agreement before the start.

Continue reading below the photo!

Riders around Frankfurt.

Lund Andresen has his nerves... about Manchester United vs Liverpool

"I hadn't raced for a month, so I asked myself whether I could test the legs before the Giro," said the Dane, who went on to win the bunch sprint at the Alte Oper. His big moment of the weekend, though, comes on Sunday — when Manchester United play Liverpool.

"What am I more nervous about? Manchester United. 100 per cent," said Andresen, who ran a lead-out camp in Spain ahead of Frankfurt and who you will be able to read more from in a longer interview on IDL Pro Cycling.

At NSN, the team has taken a slightly different approach to sprint coverage at the Giro, with Ethan Vernon targeting the flat stages and Corbin Strong the punchier finishes. The versatile lead-out man Stewart — who will take the same role at the Tour de France — and finisher Vernon raced the Tour de Catalonia together (stage win and second place) and the Loire Tour (two wins). While Strong — already fifth at Milan-San Remo — joined them in France in April with a third-place finish overall, before heading to Tenerife for altitude work.

Travel arrangements add complications

Stewart and Vernon are both based in Andorra and stayed there between races. "When you're at altitude or on a training camp, you go a few weeks without racing. This is a good race to get back into it, with the amount of climbing on offer.

In that sense it's a good opener for the Giro, where we have real ambition — with Ethan for the pure sprints, Corbin for the harder finishes, and Alessandro Pinarello for the climbing and maybe the GC."

"So we just have to deal with the travelling. It's complicated," Stewart summed up, with characteristic understatement. "But I'm flying home first — I get 24 hours with my girlfriend in Andorra. Then I fly to Bulgaria on Monday." Turner, meanwhile, has chosen to stay in Germany and travel east from there.

Continue reading below the photo!

Strong and Andresen (both right) in Milan-Sanremo.

Bax and Paasschens have a relatively manageable travel window

Several Dutch riders are also doubling up. Sjoerd Bax (Pinarello-Q36.5), Mathijs Paasschens (Bahrain Victorious) and Frank van den Broek (Picnic PostNL) are all racing both Frankfurt and the Giro, having also ridden the hill Classics — and in Van den Broek's case, the Tour of the Basque Country as well.

For Sjoerd Bax, 30, this will be his first Grand Tour. "I have a bit of healthy nerves, but I'm really looking forward to it. Frankfurt is primarily a useful race stimulus to make sure I'm genuinely ready — and the travel situation isn't too bad. I fly to Bulgaria on Tuesday, but I can still be home Friday evening after Frankfurt."

His flight from Charleroi Airport to Varna in eastern Bulgaria will have a familiar face on board. Most riders are routed via Sofia (four hours by road) or Varna (two hours), given that almost nothing flies directly into Burgas. Paasschens will be on the same plane. "Three of us from Bahrain are combining Frankfurt with the Giro," said the half-Belgian, referring to Edoardo Zambanini and Afonso Eulalio. "I've got it fairly easy because I can leave from Charleroi."

"Frankfurt is also mainly about getting back into racing for me, because after my crash and collarbone break at Paris-Nice I've only ridden Liège," he explained. "A race like this is exactly what I need before the Giro, where my main job is to support the team leaders. We're going primarily for Santiago Buitrago in the GC, and then we have riders like Damiano Caruso, Eulalio and Alec Segaert for the time trial. Zambanini and Matevž Govekar are our fast men."

Bax has a similar brief. "We take it day by day and we have Matteo Moschetti with us as our sprinter, so stage one is an immediate opportunity. Beyond that, I'll also get some freedom to race opportunistically — I've already spotted a few interesting stages, though I haven't got the exact numbers fixed in my head yet."

First things first: remember those flight numbers to Bulgaria.

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Tom van der Salm

Tom van der Salm (27) comes from the charming town of Zeilberg (Deurne) in the Netherlands and has been working as editor-in-chief & journalist at IDL Pro Cycling's parent site, In de Leiderstrui, since 2019. He travels with the peloton from the Tour de France to the AlUla Tour and from the World Championships in Rwanda or Canada to the Zilvermeercross in Mol. In his spare time he enjoys playing football, mountain biking, running, walking with his Labrador/Stabyhoun, investing, holidays, (specialty) beers, reading, cooking and watching sports & documentaries!

Contact: [email protected]

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