San Sebastian over the Tour de France? Giulio Ciccone skips cycling’s biggest race to chase one-day glory

Giulio Ciccone will not race the 2026 Tour de France, with the Lidl-Trek climber turning away from cycling’s biggest stage despite a Giro d’Italia that put him back in pink and back at the centre of the Grand Tour picture.

The Italian had left the door open to a possible appearance at the Grande Boucle after the Giro, but there were doubts from the start over whether he would take on a second three-week race in quick succession.

Three weeks on, his summer has taken a different shape. Rather than heading to the Tour, Ciccone is set to build the next phase of his season around one-day racing, with the Clasica San Sebastian and the World Championships in Montreal standing out as the major targets.

His first part of the campaign will instead end at the 2026 Italian National Championships road race. In Cuneo, Ciccone is expected to be one of Lidl-Trek’s support riders around Jonathan Milan, the obvious danger man if the national title is decided in a sprint.

At the Giro, Ciccone wore the maglia rosa for the first time, won the mountains classification and repeatedly appeared at the sharp end of selective stages, even as the overall classification moved away from him.

The Tour has already given him some of the biggest moments of his career. He wore yellow in 2019 after La Planche des Belles Filles and won the mountains classification in 2023, shaping the race without ever needing to fight for the final podium in Paris.

In 2026, there will be no repeat. Rather than chasing another Tour jersey campaign, Ciccone is heading towards a block where the targets look sharper and better suited to his punchy climbing style.

The Clasica San Sebastian is the immediate standout. Ciccone is the defending champion after his solo victory last season, one of the biggest one-day wins of his career and the kind of result that fits his profile perfectly: hard terrain, a selective finale and enough unpredictability for an aggressive climber to take control.

Montreal offers the longer-range prize. On a demanding World Championships course, Ciccone should be one of Italy’s most valuable options, particularly if the race becomes attritional and difficult to control. Before then, he is expected to ride the Vuelta a Burgos, but not the Vuelta a Espana, with the GP de Quebec and GP de Montreal also on his calendar before the Worlds road race.

The Giro delivered pink, the mountains jersey and another reminder of Ciccone’s Grand Tour instincts. The Tour will go on without him, while San Sebastian, Canada and a possible rainbow-jersey opportunity become the centre of his summer.