INTERVIEW | Antonio Tiberi on Giro crash, Tour debut, Pogacar battles - "Super hard to to achieve this level"

it is a big year for Antonio Tiberi. After proving his worth in the Grand Tours in 2024, by finishing fifth at the Vuelta a España, 2025 was a year marked by adversity and challenges. The leader of Bahrain - Victorious now has to get back to the top of the sport and in 2026 faces a new challenge at the Tour de France. In conversation with CyclingUpToDate, the Italian rider confirmed his schedule which includes several clashes with Tadej Pogacar; his relationship with Damiano Caruso; what happened in his 2025 Giro d'Italia crash and more.

"I mean, it's a completely different plan for this new season compared to next year. Compared to last year, I mean, and yeah, I think it's something nice that can give me also more motivation to approach this new season with new goals," Tiberi said to our microphones this Monday afternoon in Altea. With the sun setting outside, the Bahrain team had its media day schedules changed due to the riders' training schedule. On the day was a long ride, a good example of what the riders come and do to the Costa Blanca at this time of year. Long hours on the bike, getting to know their teammates, improving their chemistry with the old ones, replicating feeding strategies they will implement in races later in the year... Much more, whilst the staff perhaps even have their days be busier.

But Tiberi is also going to be busy throughout the year, confirming his racing schedule for the upcoming months: "Yeah, we are going to discuss in the next days, but yeah, I know that I'm going to start in [Volta a Comunitat] Valenciana. I don't do the Giro d'Italia, but I'm going to do some races in Italy like [Trofeo] Laigueglia and Tirreno Adriatico, Tirreno Adriatico is one of my best races that I really, really like and I'm happy to go again for this race. And then I'm also going to do Basque Country. No Ardennes, no. I'm going to [Tour de] Romandie and also Dauphiné before Tour de France".

It is a calendar that presents him with new challenges but also several opportunities to succeed, with four stage-races before kicking off his Grand Boucle debut. Here he will team up with Lenny Martínez, whilst Damiano Caruso is also in the plans for the Bahraini team. At the Tour, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Romandie, he will see the rainbow jersey in the same peloton, and Tiberi is one of the men who will look for an opportunity.

This year he looked ready to battle for and perhaps finish on the podium of the Giro d'Italia, but things came crashing down in the second week. After handling the first climbs of the race, the gravel of Siena and the time trial, Tiberi was one of the riders that crashed on the rainy stage 14 which also took out Giulio Ciccone from the GC; and saw the likes of Primoz Roglic and Juan Ayuso lose time. A key day for the overall, even though the finale was rather flat.

"Yeah, to this day was going everything perfect. I was in third place where we wanted to be and yeah, our objective was the podium for this Giro and until there was going everything super good and yeah, that stage in Nova Gorica with the rain, the cobblestones... Yeah it happened that in this corner I fell down and yeah, some guys also came on me and yeah, it was not an easy crash". The Italian didn't suffer fractures, but as often is the case, that does not mean the damage is there, even if spectators can't physically see something wrong.

"It was quite a hard crash and for the first days, maybe one or two days later, yeah, I was still feeling not bad. It looked like it was going everything okay, but then after three or four days, I started to feel a bit of inflammation where I had the impact and everything and the body started to suffer really a lot," he explains. This pain then hindered his performance significantly in the final days. "And yeah, then when we arrived in the stage where was the finish in Bormio with Mortirolo, yeah, already in the first climb I started to feel really a lot of pain in my left part where I had the impact".

"I was there suffering, suffering for the first day with the peloton and then when we started the climb to Mortirolo, my body was completely on the limit and yeah, I wasn't able to push to stay there with the best and yeah, it went like this. But yeah, I cannot do nothing now and also there was it was not possible to do nothing for me, nothing more. I tried to do my best, but yeah, it's like this when I'm cycling it's like this, you never know what is going to happen but for sure I can learn a lot also from this".

Tiberi finished 17th in the overall ultimately. He later on resumed racing in August, and finished second at the Tour de Pologne, anticipating another GC tilt at the Vuelta a España. However, he never truly found his legs at La Vuelta, a race he abandoned in 2024 with heat stroke.

At the Vuelta he also lacked Damiano Caruso, who fractured a hand right before the race and had to forego the Spanish Grand Tour. This proved to be a mental hit for Tiberi, as the two regularly team up, and Caruso is often his right-hand men. The veteran admit the two are friends on an off the bike, but for Tiberi he sees his compatriot as a perfect guide through the world of stage-racing, and someone who helped develop him into a Grand Tour rider.

Caruso has renewed for another year with Bahrain, pushing back his plans to retire from the sport, and Tiberi did play a role. "Yeah, a bit. A bit is true because I was pushing him a bit to sign for one more year and because after one Giro like he did this year, I said 'it's not possible. You're going to stop. You still have a really super shape. So, I mean, one year you have to continue' and yeah, I'm really happy that he decided to continue one year because it's really a point of reference for me in the team when we are racing, when we are out of the race. He's a really super guy and I can always learn a lot from him".

Caruso will be at the Giro d'Italia, but Tiberi will also be able to count on the support of his teammate at the Tour de France. "Yeah, without him maybe... I mean, with him I can feel for sure more relaxed because I know that with him, if I just only follow him, I know that I'm in the right place in the right moment because he really knows super well how to read the race, to see what is going on and to react in the best way".

The 24-year old also feels the pressure, and is growing in a peloton that races with an extra gear than a decade ago. Tiberi understands the requirements that are needed of a rider to be at the absolute top, as many expect him to be. "For sure yeah, from what I can see also, I mean, from when I'm a professional rider from when I turned pro that I was not like a leader in in Trek where I was and maybe there also it was right at that moment to also not have a lot of stress or a lot of many things to think but now with the passing of the years and now I'm one of the leaders in this team".

"And yeah, I feel that it starts to be really hard, but in the good way now that you really have to do the things at 100% with full focus and you cannot lose anything because if also you lose two or three percent of something if you compare to the contenders, then you have something less to them and in the races you will see this".

"And yeah, now in this new, this modern cycling the level is super, super high and it's also super, super hard to to achieve this level. But yeah, it's what we are here for, for this, to try to arrive at our best level ever it's what I want to do".