Mikel Landa will start his 2025 season at Strade Bianche on Saturday, where the Basque rider will face Tuscany’s white roads for the first time in his career.
In his second year with Soudal-Quickstep, the 35-year-old opted to delay his racing debut, skipping the early stage races in Portugal and Spain that have traditionally marked the start of his season.
Instead, Landa will tackle the 213km Italian Spring Classic, with its 81.7 kilometres of sterrati across 16 sections of white gravel roads. The final challenge of the day will be the steep climb on Via Santa Caterina – with its 16% maximum gradients coming just 500 metres from the finish in Piazza del Campo.
Strade Bianche provides an ideal preparation ahead of the first Grand Tour of the year for Landa, named team leader for the Giro d’Italia during a January training camp. The one-day race mirrors a key challenge of the Giro, the 30km of Tuscan gravel roads leading to the stage 9 finish in Siena’s Piazza del Campo.
“It’s a new race for me and I’m excited, because I have always loved watching it on TV,” Landa said in a team release.
“I know it will be completely different to be there on the course, in the thick of the action, and really nervous, but I will try to do my best as I get my season underway and just enjoy this experience.”
Despite having three past victories – Julian Alaphilippe (2019), Zdenek Štybar (2015), and Michal Kwiatkowski (2014) – Soudal-Quickstep recognises that they are not among the pre-race favourites, especially with two-time winner Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) on the start list.
“It’s one of the most beautiful, but also one of the hardest races of the season, and we are motivated to give our best and leave everything out there. It won’t be easy and we don’t start as the favourites, but we have a solid team that comes to the start after some strong outings last week, so we are confident in our chances of being involved in the fight for a nice result,” said sports director Davide Bramati.
Joining Landa at the start in Siena will be Mattia Cattaneo, Gianmarco Garofoli, Pepijn Reinderink, Pieter Serry, Tour of Oman stage 2 winner Louis Vervaeke and Mauri Vansevenant, who finished ninth overall at O Gran Camiño.
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