Preview, favourites, profile, route and predictions Tour of Guangxi 2025 stage 5 - UAE main favourites for the win; Can Magnier keep the race lead on queen stage?

The Tour of Guangxi is the final World Tour event of the year and it closes out the calendar in Asia. China hosts the six-day race where there are still lots of UCI points to attribute and some meaningful victories too. Stage 5 will take place on the 18th of October. The stage is set to start at 05:12CET and finish at 08:40CET.

As is the case every year, the race returns to have its queen stage into Nongla. It's an 'unipuerto' stage as the Spanish would call it, completely flat day with one climb coinciding with the finish - which just so happens to be short and quite steep, as is usually the case in Spain too.

The climb is 3.2 kilometers long at 7.3% and early attacks can be dangerous, but most riders will wait for the final 1.2 kilometers which average almost 15%. It's a very steep and brutal finale, fit for the puncheurs and also climbers, and where the decisive differences in the race should be created.

UAE is the team to beat here, you can't say the stage will be hard to control for anyone so it will be a matter of keeping the powder dry until the final climb, doing a proper leadout and then having the best legs in what is an anaerobic effort - where the final 1.2 kilometers will matter, an attack beforehand is likely suicidal.

In both Jhonatan Narváez and Jan Christen the team has options to fight for the win, but there is a quality group of riders that have good form and can contest it Victor Lafay, Mikkel Honoré, Thomas Gloag and Paul Double are men to take into consideration, whilst the likes of Pello Bilbao and Roger Adrià could also take the win if they find their best form.

It will also be interesting to see how the in-form Paul Magnier can survive this climb, having 33 seconds of lead over Narváez who is the first of the big GC riders, and 40 over the majority of his rivals. He can climb to some degree, so it'll be interesting to see if the overall win will be possible.

*** Jhonatan Narváez, Jan Christen
** Victor Lafay, Mikkel Honoré, Thomas Gloag, Paul Double
* Ewen Costiou, Pello Bilbao, Aurélien Paret-Peintre, Remy Rochas, Roger Adrià, Jorgen Nordhagen, Anthon Charmig

Pick: Jhonatan Narváez

How: UAE will pace hard in the first part of the climb and the Ecuadorian will be the strongest on the steep wall to the finish.