There are 3156.5 km to go for the 78th edition of the Vuelta 2023 which kicks off on Saturday 26 August from Barcelona with a team time trial. Before closing in Madrid on 17 September, another individual time trial, nine uphill finishes, four hypothetical sprints and many tricky stages are expected.

A tough race that will see the return of the Tourmalet , in the 13th stage, and of the extremely tough Angliru in the 17th stage. For an analysis of the route click on the video with Faith and the Mullah: 9 uphill finishes | COURSE ANALYSIS and ALTIMETRIES Vuelta Espana 2023 - YouTube

To talk about the favourites, we can only start from Jumbo Visma chasing the winning trio in the grand tours with Jonas Vingegaard , first in the Tour, and Primoz Roglic , winner of the Giro d'Italia. The two will have a super team at the start with Sepp Kuss who will participate in his third consecutive grand tour, and valuable riders such as Wilco Kelderman, Dylan Van Baarle, and Attila Valter. The third wheel should come out of these riders: Remco Evenepoel above all, defending champion, expected to be confirmed at a high level in the three weeks, Geraint Thomas , captain of Ineos who also lines up Thymen Arensman and Egan Bernal, the Uae Emirates duo formed by Joao Almeida and Juan Ayuso (supported by Marc Soler and Jay Vine), Enric Mas returning to racing after the accident in the first stage of the Tour, and Aleksandr Vlasov of Bora hansgrohe, who will be able to count on the help of Lennard Kamna, Sergio Higuita and Cian Uijdebroeks.

Then pay attention to the Bahrain Victorious of Mikel Landa, Damiano Caruso and Santiago Buitrago and to some expert loose cannons (Romain Bardet of Dsm, Rui Costa of Intermarché, Eddie Dunbar of Jayco AlUla and Hugh Carthy of EF) and young people (Romain Gregoire and Lenny Martinez of Groupama, Lennert Van Eetvelt of Lotto and Max Poole of DSM).

Few sprinters at the start: we point out Kaden Groves of Alpecin, Juan Sebastian Molano of Uae, Gerben Thijssen of Intermarché, Bryan Coquard of Cofidis and Alberto Dainese of Dsm. Speaking of Italians, we have a good representation at the start capable of competing for stage successes: from Filippo Ganna and Matteo Sobrero for the time trials, to Filippo Zana, Andrea Bagioli, Samuele Battistella, Lorenzo Milesi, Andrea Vendrame, Lorenzo Germani, Andrea Piccolo and Davide Cimolai .

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