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  "description": "Meet the Wheel Talk Pod audio diarists for the Giro daily pods!",
  "path": "/wheel-talk-newsletter-drum-roll-please/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-05-26T18:08:33.000Z",
  "site": "https://escapecollective.com",
  "tags": [
    "‘Perfectly imperfect’: Elisa Longo Borghini reflects on her 2025 Giro victoryAs told exclusively to Escape, here’s the Italian champion’s account of winning last year’s Giro d’Italia.Escape CollectiveAbby Mickey",
    "After 1,033 days, Yara Kastelijn is finally a winner againAfter nearly three years of almosts, the Dutchwoman broke her drought at the Vuelta a Burgos on Sunday.Escape CollectiveMatt de Neef",
    "Subscribe now"
  ],
  "textContent": "It's Giro time!\n\nThe Vuelta a Burgos is behind us, and with it the Spanish block of races. Most of the top GC contenders who will be looking to contest either the Giro d'Italia or the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift made a test appearance at the Vuelta Femenina, Burgos, or the Itzulia, with a few notable exceptions. Obviously, the biggest name set to start the Giro on Saturday, who didn't race at all in Spain, is Demi Vollering, but Marlen Reusser is also on the startlist.\n\nThe world time trial champion hasn't raced since crashing out of the Tour of Flanders, but with an ITT in this year's Giro (even a half-uphill one), it's very exciting to see Reusser on the preliminary startlist.\n\nICYMI: During the offseason, I spoke with Elisa Longo Borghini about her Giro win in 2025. Read all about it, in Elisa's own words, here.\n\n‘Perfectly imperfect’: Elisa Longo Borghini reflects on her 2025 Giro victoryAs told exclusively to Escape, here’s the Italian champion’s account of winning last year’s Giro d’Italia.Escape CollectiveAbby Mickey\n\n* * *\n\n## First things first: Some quick takeaways from Burgos...\n\n_(Can I just leave the first one from last week?):_**Mischa Bredewold is the moment**\n\nFresh off an amazing win in the Itzulia, Mischa Bredewold was at it again. After helping Lorena Wiebes to two stage victories, the Dutch rider got her own chance to snag stage 3, and boy, did she. First, she destroyed the peloton on the final climb, and once she'd attacked the climbers and was with only Amanda Spratt and Silke Smulders, she attacked again, bridged to Mireia Benito, and then went and won the stage. Even when Benito forced Bredewold to pull into the finale, the former European champ couldn't be stopped from taking her fourth win in Spain.\n\nThe stage victory meant that Bredewold won a stage at every one of the Spanish races: stage 5 at the Vuelta, stage 1 at the Itzulia, and stage 3 in Burgos. Wild.\n\nBehind, Wiebes still finished third on the stage, and it was clear that the then-race leader was thrilled to hand leadership to Bredewold for a day.\n\nWhat was perhaps even more impressive was Bredewold's ride on Sunday. It was the stage that finally suited the pure climbers, and the stage that would determine the overall classification. Bredewold, not traditionally known as a climber, finished an amazing fifth, two seconds ahead of Maeva Squiban, Amanda Spratt, and Shirin van Anrooij.\n\nTo be fair, Lagunas de Neila is on the shorter side, but it was long enough for the climbers to emerge victorious.\n\n**Yara Kastelijn takes a step up**\n\nMatt broke down why the final stage meant so much to Kastelijn:\n\nAfter 1,033 days, Yara Kastelijn is finally a winner againAfter nearly three years of almosts, the Dutchwoman broke her drought at the Vuelta a Burgos on Sunday.Escape CollectiveMatt de Neef\n\nFor Fenix-Premier Tech, Kastelijn's overall win puts them in the conversation for the Tour overall. Kastelijn isn't set to race the Giro next week, but after losing Pauliena Rooijakkers to UAE Team ADQ over the offseason (shoutout to the Dutch rider who finished third at the Tour in 2024 – Rooijakkers just announced her pregnancy on Monday, meaning she will be out of the peloton for the foreseeable future), Fenix-Premier Tech is down one GC contender. Kastelijn was supposed to be part of their attack plan at the Tour last year, along with Puck Pieterse, but it was Rooijakkers who came out on top.\n\n**Évita finally got her chance**\n\nThe next best climber in the race was FDJ United-Suez's Évita Muzic, who rode to second overall on Sunday, 20 seconds behind Kastelijn. Muzic has been knocking at that door for so long, and even finished fourth overall at the Tour in 2024, but last year the French rider was on domestique duties for Demi Vollering. This was her chance to prove herself, and even if she didn't win the race, she came out of the Spanish block with some very consistent results, enough to have taken second overall in the Spanish Grander Tour (a name coined by Seabhac7 on the Wheel Talk members-only Discord chat). More on that in a bit.\n\nMuzic continues to progress as a rider, and I think watching her sprint for stages in both the Vuelta and Itzulia highlights where she could be in a few years, or even as soon as next season. She has always been a strong climber, but it's those smaller moments where she is continuing to prove that she is made for something bigger. FDJ United-Suez has always seen it, and with some guidance from Vollering and her other top teammate, Juliette Berthet, Muzic will get there.\n\n**Everyone is sprinting for second**\n\nLoren maintained on the podcast this week that Charlotte Kool will show up ready to challenge Lorena Wiebes at some point, but at the moment, and definitely at the Vuelta a Burgos, the rest of the sprinters were riding for second. Wiebes remains unmatched in the sprint, especially when she has her dialed lead-out train at the race. Since Kool bested her at the Tour in August of 2024, only Carys Lloyd has been able to win a sprint when Wiebes was in the race, but whenever the Dutch national champion has a straight shot at the line, she cannot be matched.\n\n**Teams eyeing a new signing should be looking at Usoa Ostolaza**\n\nThe 28-year-old Spanish rider finished eighth in the final stage of the Vuelta, which secured her fourth overall. She then finished fourth in the final stage of the Itzulia and seventh overall there. At the Vuelta a Burgos, her form only improved. She finished the final stage atop Lagunas de Neila in third behind Kastelijn and Muzic, which meant she finished third overall. She was one of the few riders to tackle all three races, which meant she easily won the Spanish Grander Tour:\n\n  1. Usao Ostolaza (Laboral Kutxa-Fundacion Euskadi)\n  2. Evita Muzic (FDJ United-Suez) +01:06\n  3. Yara Kastelijn (Fenix-Premier Tech) +03:05\n  4. Lotte Claes (Fenix-Premier Tech) +05:42\n  5. Mischa Bredewold (SD Worx-Protime) +22:36\n\n\n\nBredewold's loss is mostly due to the Vuelta Femenina, where she was riding (at least in terms of the overall) for Anna van der Breggen. But Ostolaza, Muzic, and Kastelijn all seemed to improve as the weeks went on.\n\nShoutout to Seabhac7 on the Discord for doing all those calculations!\n\n* * *\n\n## Racing continues...\n\nAt the Giro d'Italia Women from May 30 to June 7!\n\nOne of the best races of the year is nearly here! The Giro d'Italia. Arguably, this year seems like a bigger deal than it has for some time, perhaps because the race will not be eclipsed by the Tour de France Hommes this year, with its new date that overlaps the end of the men's Giro. Or perhaps it's the return of Vollering to the race, or the fact that the GC has so many exciting names lining up to try to take pink. It might be that the last two editions have been incredible from start to finish, but there is just something about the Giro... and this year feels very special.\n\nI will write a full route preview as well as a contenders preview on _Escape Collective_ later this week. For now, here are a few of the stages for you to look forward to:\n\n## Stage 1: Cesenatico to Ravenna (139 km)\n\n**When:** Saturday, May 30, 2026 at 15:30 CEST (22:30 AEST, 9:30 EDT)\n_Estimated finish: 18:40 CEST (+1 02:40 AEST, 12:40 EDT)_\n**Stage type:** Flat\n\n**Live coverage:** 🇦🇺 SBS 22:30 AEST, 🇪🇺 HBOMax 14:30 CEST, 🇬🇧 HBOMax 13:30 BST, 🇺🇸 Peacock 8:30 EDT, 🇨🇦 FloBikes 8:30 EDT\n\n## Stage 4: Belluno to Nevegal Tudor ITT (12.7 km)\n\n**Date:** Tuesday, June 2 at TBA\n**Stage type:** Time trial\n\n**Live coverage:** 🇦🇺 SBS 22:15 AEST, 🇪🇺 HBOMax 14:15 CEST, 🇬🇧 HBOMax 13:15 BST, 🇺🇸 Peacock 8:15 EDT, 🇨🇦 FloBikes 8:15 EDT\n\n## Stage 8: Rivoli to Sestriere (105 km)\n\n**Date:** Saturday, June 6 at 14:05 CEST (22:05 AEST, 8:05 EDT)\n_Estimated finish: 17:30 CEST (+1 1:30 AEST, 11:30 EDT)_\n**Stage type:** MOUNTAINS\n\n**Live coverage:** 🇦🇺 SBS 23:15 AEST, 🇪🇺 HBOMax 15:15 CEST, 🇬🇧 HBOMax 14:15 BST, 🇺🇸 Peacock 9:15 EDT, 🇨🇦 FloBikes 9:15 EDT\n\n### This post is for subscribers only\n\nBecome a member to get access to all content\n\nSubscribe now",
  "title": "Wheel Talk Newsletter: Drum roll, please!",
  "updatedAt": "2026-05-26T18:08:36.199Z"
}