Cycling
2026 Tour de France: First Stage Predictions
The 113th edition of the Tour de France returns this weekend, with the worlds best riders setting of in Barcelona on Saturday. William Hill News looks ahead to how Stage 1 could shape up.
Our Prediction: UAE Team Emirates to win Stage 1, with Tadej Pogačar taking the first yellow jersey of the 2026 Tour de France.
The Grand Départ leaves Spanish soil for only the third time in race history, with the peloton tackling a 19.6km course that loops out from the Parc del Fòrum along Barcelona’s seafront before finishing atop Montjuïc.
It’s the first time the Tour has opened with a team time trial since 1971, and a rule change means every rider’s individual finish time counts towards the general classification rather than the traditional time of the fourth or fifth-man home. That single tweak turns Saturday’s opener into a genuine GC event before the race has barely begun.
The route
After a flat, fast opening 15km built for raw power, the finale bites hard. Two ascents of Montjuïc await, including a punchy 800m ramp at 7% into the finish by the old Olympic Stadium. Expect the domestiques to bury themselves on the flat before their leaders are launched alone up the closing climb, meaning this is as much about a team’s engine room as it is about star power.
Team time trial prediction
UAE Team Emirates head into the stage as the outright favourites. With Tadej Pogačar surrounded by a squad built for exactly this kind of test, they combine the raw power to fly on the flat with the climbing legs to hold their advantage on the Montjuïc finale.
Team Visma | Lease a Bike look the biggest threat to that dominance. Their time-trialling pedigree is arguably unmatched in the peloton, and putting Jonas Vingegaard into the first yellow jersey of the race would be the perfect statement of intent from a team that has spent the season building towards this Tour.
Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe, fronted by Remco Evenepoel, and Netcompany-INEOS, who can call on world time trial champion Filippo Ganna, both look capable of forcing their way into podium contention on the day, even if neither carries quite the same weight of expectation as the top two.
Yellow jersey prediction
Given the finishing climb rewards a punchy finisher over an out-and-out time triallist, the smart money should be on one of the GC favourites going solo in the closing 800m rather than a pure rouleur. Pogačar’s turn of pace on short, sharp gradients makes him the man to beat for the first yellow jersey of the race, but Vingegaard’s climbing pedigree means he can’t be discounted if Visma’s TTT unit does its job on the flat.
