Tirreno-Adriatico 2025 stage 3 preview, profiles, favourites & predictions - Milan, Philipsen, Van Aert, Magnier and Lund Andresen battle in a bunch sprint

Tirreno-Adriatico 2026 is taking place from the 9th to the 15th of March and is, as is the case every year, one of the most important races of the spring. It not only provides sprinters, time trialists and climbers with golden opportunities in one of Italy's top events; but also provides the classics specialists with ideal races to prepare for their big goals. We preview stage 3, which is expected to start and finish at 10:40 and 15:45CET.

The race was created back in 1966 and as the name suggests, it takes rider riders from the Tyrrhenian sea all the way to the Adriatic; crossing central Italy from west to east with a variety of stages that suits all types of riders. Dino Zandegù won the first edition, but it didn't take long for big international names to join the race; even if Paris-Nice was always in the same slot, calendar-wise. The six consecutive GC wins of Roger de Vlaeminck from 1972 to 1977 boosted the race to the highest of levels possible, and lots of legends have cemented their name in the week-long stage-race.

Francesco Moser, Giuseppe Saronni, Joop Zoetemelk and Tony Rominger are riders who won throughout the 20th century; whilst this century a few editions did not have mountain stages which increased the variety of overall winners. Classics specialists such as Paolo Bettini and Óscar Freire won it at their prime; Fabian Cancellara won it back in 2008 and even Greg Van Avermaet took the title in 2016 most recently...

However the quality of the winners over the past 15 years is outerwordly, with many of the world's very best climbers winning the overall classification at the prime of their career. Cadel Evans, Vincenzo Nibali, Alberto Contador, Nairo Quintana, Primoz Roglic, Simon Yates, Tadej Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard... It's hard to image a better list. In 2025 Juan Ayuso inserted his name amongst the greats, winning the overall classification after winning the queen stage, dethrnoing a Filippo Ganna who showed the very best climbing legs of his career.

Stage 3 is a day for the sprinters but by no means is it an easy or simple one - far from that. In fact it is quite the opposite, perhaps the hardest stage the organizers could design whilst maintaining the stance that it is a pure sprint.

The riders face 221 kilometers on the menu, a long distance which provides some sort of preparation for Milano-Sanremo. The start of the stage is flat, however the roads all throughout the final two third are quite rolling. There are 2400 climbing meters on the day; not a ton but this and the distance will weight on the legs of many by the time they have to do an all-out effort and a sprint.

The final meaningful climb ends with 40 kilometers to go, it is 7 kilometers long at 4%, where we can see some teams pushing the pace with good reasoning behind it. Later on, the arrival to Magliano de' Marsi is not technical in any way, a very long finishing straight into town where the experienced leadouts can do their thing.

Jonathan Milan - The Italian has his full leadout here, and at this point of the spring, he has to be in good form because there are plenty goals ahead. For this reason I don't think the climbing or the distance will be much of an issue for him. Whilst there are other very good leadouts around, I think Lidl-Trek can handle it quite well and from what we've seen this year, Milan will ordinarily win a battle against Jasper Philipsen.

Jasper Philipsen - But Philipsen can't be rathed the same way he was in the Algarve, where his performances were poor. Here he has Mathieu van der Poel has a leadout, and that makes all the difference for the Belgian. I think the combo can work quite well and he has good chances of winning; the issue is his rivals will be some of the world's very best.

The sprinter list in this race is quite impressive, with at least four of five riders above the best that are at Paris-Nice. Take Tobias Lund Andresen for example, with Tord Gudmestad as a leadout... Decathlon can absolutely contest here with the very best, even if they lack Olav Kooij. Or Paul Magnier, who has started out his season incredibly well and can not only climb, but seems to actively be improving in the pure flat sprints. They can both win here. On paper Sam Welsford does have the speed to win, but he can't handle any sort of climbing... But the INEOS rider finished quite high in the time trial which is a promising sign that he may have good form, which would significantly improve his chances here.

There is Wout van Aert too who must be taken into consideration, he will surely give it a go to try and work on his form, positioning and pure speed, but I think a bunch sprint is out of his league at the moment because he really does struggle in the peloton. On the opposite, Danny van Poppel is a master at positioning and should do quite well here, regardless of form.

Add to the mix Pavel Bittner, Arnaud de Lie, Giovanni Lonardi, Madis Mihkels, Andrea Vendrame, Luca Mozzato, Fernando Gaviria and Corbin Strong, and we have got a true quality bunch sprint...

*** Jonathan Milan, Jasper Philipsen
** Paul Magnier, Tobias Lund Andresen, Danny van Poppel
* Arnaud de Lie, Pavel Bittner, Giovanni Lonardi, Andrea Vendrame, Sam Welsford, Wout van Aert, Luca Mozzato

Pick: Jonathan Milan

How: Regular bunch sprint.