Ferrand-Prévot and Vos will start their seasons on the white roads of Tuscany, but Vollering and Longo Borghini have a head start on their racing form.
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If the Omloop Nieuwsblad was a starter, Strade Bianche is the main. Favoured among riders and fans alike, this delicious slice of Tuscany delivers year on year. There’s a reason Pauline Ferrand-Prévot is starting her 2026 season at the race.
Last year, the mentor Anna van der Breggen came face-to-face with her mentee Demi Vollering, now considered one of the very best in the sport. Hometown hero and Giro d’Italia winner Elisa Longo Borghini had a bad day, and eventual Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift winner Ferrand-Prévot tested out her road legs on familiar dirt terrain. Vollering proved the best of all the big names, and going into its 12th edition, the European champion looks hard to beat. Still, there will be many who will try, which is great news for those at home. Looking for the men’s preview? Dane Cash has you covered.
Preview: Is Pogačar a shoo-in to set a new Strade Bianche record?
Even on an easier route than last year, Pogačar’s biggest challenger could be within his own team.
The Basics
When: Saturday, March 7th @ 10:15 CET
Where: Siena, Italy: 133 km (33 km of gravel)
Live coverage: Australia – SBS (with Gracie Elvin!) @ 22:25 AEST, Europe – HBOMax @ 11:45 CET, UK – TNT/Discovery+ @ 10:45 GMT, Canada – FloBikes @ 5:45 EST
One late change: although it has rights to the race in the US, HBO Max does not list it on the upcoming schedule and we’re told will not be showing it. A VPN should get you access to other options, whether through your FloBikes subscription (Flo has rights for Canada), or to SBS On Demand in Australia or RAI in Italy.
How to watch pro bike racing in 2026
A complete guide for how to watch the Tour de France and every 2026 men’s and women’s WorldTour road race for audiences in the US, Australia, Canada, and the UK, plus tips on how to save money.
The favourites:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, Demi Vollering, Elisa Longo Borghini
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: Kim Le Court-Pienaar, Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney
⭐️⭐️⭐️: Puck Pieterse
⭐️⭐️: Lotte Kopecky, Magdeleine Vallieres
⭐️: Marianne Vos, Elise Chabbey, Noemi Rüegg, Niamh Fisher-Black, Liane Lippert
The weather
Most of the time, the weather doesn’t play a large role in Strade Bianche. There’s always the odd year when it’s really hot, which makes the risk of punctures more prominent, and of course, because of the dirt roads, if there’s any rain, that also dramatically impacts the race.
After a cold and damp race in Belgium last weekend, the women can expect a warm sunny day on Saturday. According to forecasts, there is very little chance of wind and a one percent chance of precipitation.
The route
Why fix something that isn’t broken? The route for the 2026 race is very similar to the 2025 route, with some changes in the opening kilometres. The important points from the longest gravel sector/climb – San Martino in Grania – to the finish in Piazza del Campo remain the same.
The changes made early in the race cut out two long sectors of gravel and shorten some of the earlier sectors, which means the women will actually race 17 km less gravel total this year compared to 2025. One 9.3 km sector was cut just before the San Martino in Grania sector, possibly because there were some nasty crashes on that sector last year in both the men’s and women’s races.
Overall, these changes will probably not impact the outcome of the race as most of the big moves are made on the final three sectors, but it does mean that the top riders will likely have more team support going into the second half of the race. With fewer gravel obstacles in the first half of the race and the level of the peloton evening out, expect a huge group going into the circuits, where normally there are only 20+ riders left in the race.
With more teammates available, the big names can also make the race faster as it goes into those final sectors, making it harder for second-tier favourites t0 attack and try to get ahead of the major throws that will come late in the race.
Gravel sector specifics:
122.5 km to go, 2.4 km long116.5 km to go, 3.5 km long106.9 km to go, 4.4 km long*76.3 km to go, 9.4 km long (this is also the longest climb on the course) 53.6 km to go, 600 m long49.2 km to go, 2.4 km long (first of two passes, also sector 10) 42.9 km, 1.1 km long (first of two passes, also sector 11)39.6 km, 700 m long*25.8 km to go, 3.3 km long*19.1 km, 2.4 km long*12.8 km to go, 1.1 km long
*Indicates important sectors that have dramatically impacted the race in the past.
As mentioned above, the parts of the course where we have seen the most drama in the past are all after the 50 km to go mark, but more specifically on the second pass of the circuit that makes up the 6th/10th and 7th/11th sectors of gravel. The race has traditionally been down to only the strongest left by that second pass, although some teams have occasionally still had numbers, like FDJ United-Suez last year and SD Worx-Protime before them.
Of course, one of the most exciting sections of the race is the final 1.5 km, which features a 16% climb to the finish in the Pizza del Campo. The climb and the tight turns on the cobbled streets of Siena make for a dramatic finish no matter who has made it to the finale.
The biggest names in women’s cycling vs the future of the sport
Quite a few of the bigger names opted to sit out of the Omloop last weekend, leaving Vollering and Niewiadoma-Phinney to fight for the win. This weekend we will see the return of not only Ferrand-Prévot, but also Longo Borghini, who so dominantly won the UAE Tour in February, Kim Le Court-Pienaar, who transformed as a rider in 2025 and yet has only scratched the surface of what she is capable of, and Puck Pieterse, who finished in the top 10 of every. single. race she did from Omloop through the third stage of the Tour last year.
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