Stage 1 Preview: Albania Launches the 2025 Giro d’Italia

The countdown is over! Just a few hours to go before the Giro d’Italia 2025 gets underway. Albania has already turned pink for this historic Grande Partenza, the 15th foreign start in the 108 editions of the Corsa Rosa.
Opening the race is a stage that’s anything but straightforward: 164 kilometers from Durrës (Durazzo) to Tiranë (Tirana). Don’t be fooled by the fact that both start and finish are in major cities—just like the opening stage in Turin in 2024, this is shaping up to be another example of a “mountain stage in the city,” with significant elevation changes keeping the riders on their toes from start to finish.

The climb of Surrel

The first 70 kilometers of the stage will be flat, but then it’s time for the first climb of the Giro: the ascent to Gracen (cat. 2, 13.5 km at 5.2%, with pitches up to 11%). However, with more than 80 kilometers still to go after the summit, it’s unlikely to cause major splits.
Things will heat up once the riders descend and enter Tirana, where a 22.2 km finishing circuit, to be tackled twice, will thin out the group and point the way toward the first Maglia Rosa. The key feature here is the climb to Surrel (cat. 3, 6.9 km at 4.6%), which is likely to prove decisive. The second ascent tops out less than 12 kilometers from the finish, making it the perfect springboard for anyone brave enough to launch an attack.
The climb itself is about 4 kilometers long, with particularly sharp gradients in the first kilometer before settling at around 5% to the top. And so it will be Tirana, Albania’s political, cultural, and economic capital, that crowns the first wearer of the Maglia Rosa.

Preview stage 1: Van Aert vs Pedersen?

The outcome of Stage 1 will depend heavily on how the peloton tackles the final circuit, but no matter the approach, all eyes will be on Wout Van Aert (Visma | Lease a Bike). The three-day Albanian opener seems tailor-made for his skill set, and expectations are high for him to make an immediate statement.
That said, Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) is another name to watch, especially if he’s in the same form he showed during the Northern Classics.
The first Maglia Rosa is a coveted prize, and we can expect a fierce battle all the way to the final meter.