"I will no longer fight for the classification" - Giro-Tour double for Giulio Ciccone, but no more 'pink dream

Giulio Ciccone is a tremendously talented climber and a rider who often performs well in the stage-races. But the Grand Tours are a different monster, and the Italian has often encountered tough obstacles that got in his way. Hence from 2026 onwards, Ciccone will not be aiming for a overall classification result in them.

“My season has been very good. Every year has its ups and downs," Ciccone said in conversation with Gazzetta dello Sport. "The goal is to repeat 2025 by starting off well, perhaps debuting at the UAE Tour. My dream is to win a Monument classic, my dream is Liège, and I consider that second place behind Pogacar a victory".

Ciccone's power seems to be in the one-day races, and transmittable to short stage-races. This is no longer a question but a point with a definitive answer, and the Italian is still in the prime of his career.

In 2024 he ended his season with a third place behind Tadej Pogacar and Remco Evenepoel at Il Lombardia, and this year he backed that up with a second place behind the Slovenian at both the UAE Tour and Liège-Bastogne-Liége, the victory at the Clàsica San Sebastiàn, sixth place at the Kigali World Championships and stage wins at the Tour of the Alps and Vuelta a Burgos. A truly successful year, perhaps the best thus far. This, for a rider who has in the past won the KOM classification at both Giro d'Italia and Tour de France, as well as high-quality wins in other races.

But in the Grand Tours it simply hasn't clicked. In fact Ciccone has completed 9 out of the 15 he's started and never actually finished one in the Top10. At the 2024 Tour he rode for GC and actually had a very strong performance, but came up just short of a Top10 in what was one of the most incredibly competitive fields in modern cycling. But an 11th place in a Grand Tour is nothing for a rider of this caliber.

This year he had high and real ambitions of finishing high in the Giro d'Italia. But if the illnesses or fatigue don't catch up to him, it's ordinarily a crash. And that's what happened on stage 14, when he was riding along in 7th place. "There was the crash in Gorizia at the Giro d’Italia, which forced me to withdraw on the eve of the big mountains when I was sure I would do very well".

And then, after winning the Clàsica San Sebastián and the queen stage of the Vuelta a Burgos, he started the Vuelta a España as the third biggest podium contender alongside Jonas Vingegaard and João Almeida (who did deliver on their expectations on first and second on GC). He started the race very strongly, but began to fade as the race progressed. On stage 14 to La Farrapona he cracked and fell out of GC - finishing 18th by the end of it. This time it was a buttock infection that persisted and hampered his performance in the second week.

This sees Ciccone drop his ambitions of racing for Grand Tour GC's, despite still having the potential to improve on his previous results. With Juan Ayuso joining Lidl-Trek and Mattias Skjelmose, the pressure is also off the Italian's shoulders. And Ciccone will be backing up both riders in their Grand Tour bids in 2026, he confirms:

"In 2026 I will race the Giro d’Italia and the Tour de France, but I declare now that, whatever stage race I do, I will no longer fight for the classification," he explains. "I will aim to win the stages and do what I do best: attack even from afar, win the big stages. I also want to wear the pink jersey, but now I want to go back to enjoying the stages and the races, to having fun."