Tour of the Alps: where, how to watch and favourites for the victory

With the Giro d'Italia just around the corner, the riders are heading to the 2022 Tour of the Alps, from 18 to 24 April, to complete their preparations for the opening round of the Grand Tours.

The Tour of the Alps, over five stages through the regions of Trentino, Südtirol and Tirol, between Italy and Austria, is once again shaping up to be a touchstone for assessing the form of some of the contenders for the maglia rosa in the Giro d'Italia, which starts on 6 May.

The favourites

A glance at the list of participants gives us a glimpse of who the theoretical favourites are, despite the fact that most of them are coming to the Alpine event with little competitive experience in 2022.

Among those who have been in fantastic form is Pello Bilbao (Bahrain - Victorious), who showed his quality in the recent Itzulia, where he won a stage and was close to the final podium, although he finished 5th.

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However, the Biscayan will have to share the limelight with Mikel Landa (Bahrain - Victorious) who starts the race with the Giro as his main objective for the season, trying to corroborate in this Tour of the Alps the progression in his form after the third step of the podium achieved in Tirreno-Adriatico.

Facing them, the Colombian Miguel Angel Lopez will be the strongest asset of the Astana team, who will try to show the level he showed during the Vuelta a Andalucia.

There are more doubts about their chances of taking the final victory for riders such as Thibaut Pinot (Groupama - FDJ), Romain Bardet (Team DSM) or Richie Porte (INEOS - Grenadiers), although on paper they should be in the places of honour.

Route of the Tour of the Alps 

Five tough stages await the riders, with the summits that give the Tour of the Alps its name as the main course:

Stage 1: Cles - Primiero/S. Martino di Castrozza – 18/04/2022

Stage 2: Primiero/S. Martinodi Castrozza - Lana – 19/04/2022

Stage 3: Lana - Niederdorf/Villabassa – 20/04/2022

Stage 4: Niederdorf/Villabassa - Kals am Großglockner – 21/04/2022

Stage 5: Lienz - Lienz – 22/04/2022

How to watch the Tour of the Alps 2022

The stages can be followed live on Eurosport's E1 channel and its partner platforms Eurosport Player and GCN+ from 14:00 (stages 1 and 2, 4 and 5) and 13:00 (stage 3).