PREVIEW | Itzulia Basque Country 2024 stage 1 - Evenepoel, Vingegaard, Ayuso and Roglic face-off in hilly time-trial

Itzulia Basque Country starts this Monday with a thrilling time-trial which will see the likes of Remco Evenepoel, Jonas Vingegaard go head-to-head on stage 1, a day that is already going to be important for the overall classification.

10 kilometers to start off the race. The opening day of the Basque race features a small individual time-trial, where gaps can be created however. This certainly is not an effort for the pure specialists but instead for those in-form. It features climbing, descending and it is definitely one that is not easy to manage the effort.

There is a small cobbled ramp early in the effort that will make for good images, but the most key point of the time-trial is the climb up to the intermediate point. It is 1.7 kilometers at over 5%, with some steep ramps present certainly.

What follows all the way back into Irun are mostly downhill and flat roads, non-technical, where speed will be very high. The riders still find an uphill ramp to the line, the efforts do not end there.

Relatively strong wind from the southwest. Actually this can indeed make a difference on the day, we will see a headwind throughout the first half of the time-trial including the climb; whilst there will be a tailwind in the descent back into town which will make it even faster. The first part of the TT will become even more crucial for the outcome of the day.

Remco Evenepoel - Non ironically this may be the best field of GC riders/TT specialists I have ever seen in a stage-race, only missing Tadej Pogacar pretty much from the top riders. We've got plenty riders in top form racing against the clock in a very tricky TT, where climbing will matter. Evenepoel is the first of many big contenders, the reigning TT World Champion has won already this year in the Algarve and it was also hilly there. A short explosive effort, with some wind, it's a perfect scenario for the Belgian but he does face fierce competition.

Jonas Vingegaard - Vingegaard is the defending champion and dominated the competition last year. As we've seen at the Tour de France he can obliterate the competition in a time-trial, but I'd argue this is not tough enough for him - but is tough enough for him to be Evenepoel's main competitor. He knows that in this race he will not be without competition, and so he must take risks and give it his all to have a strong say in the fight for the yellow jersey.

Primoz Roglic - A big wildcard. In the ideal conditions this is such a good time-trial for Primoz Roglic, but he has not looked at his best at Paris-Nice and has not yet raced a time-trial this season. He's got a new TT setup and equipment, Specialized is very good at this however it will be his first and so it's not exactly certain that he will have the same level he had at Visma.

UAE - Juan Ayuso beat Filippo Ganna in a flat time-trial at Tirreno-Adriatico and put 22 seconds into Jonas Vingegaard. It was a scary strong performance and the Spaniard was consistent all week. Aerodynamically speaking I would say he's at the level of Evenepoel which is a good sign for him in the second half of the TT, and climbing wise I would also say he's there. The problem for him is that he really does have to beat both Evenepoel and Vingegaard who should both be in or near peak form; so although I wouldn't be shocked if he won, he definitely has a big task at hand. Brandon McNulty, Jay Vine and Isaac Del Toro each are very strong time-trialists and, specially in such terrain, could also feature among the very best on the day.

Mattias Skjelmose is also very well up there, another superb time-trialist who loves this terrain and should be in great form. But in this field it'll be so hard to take a win. We've got a few brilliant descenders such as Tom Pidcock, Pello Bilbao, Ion Izagirre, Matteo Sobrero and Alex Aranburu who can certainly do this type of climb very well and could benefit a few seconds in the final part of the time-trial.

We've got other strong climbers who should also do relatively well on the day such as Jai Hindley, Tao Geoghegan Hart, Santiago Buitrago, Kévin Vauquelin and Carlos Rodríguez who should be up there and eyeing a good result, whilst I'd also name outsiders in Ben Tulett, Samuel Battistella and Oscar Onley.

*** Remco Evenepoel, Juan Ayuso
** Jonas Vingegaard, Primoz Roglic, Mattias Skjelmose
* Brandon McNulty, Isaac Del Toro, Jay Vine, Matteo Sobrero, Jai Hindley, Ion Izagirre, Tom Pidcock, Pello Bilbao

Pick: Remco Evenepoel