The 2025 Vuelta Femenina kicks off on Sunday afternoon with a now-traditional stage 1 team time trial. This year's opener takes place in the Catalonian capital of Barcelona, taking in a flat 8.1km route.
With the first red jersey of the race up for grabs, teams will be very motivated to win this, and even though the length is short so the gaps will be small, stage 1 will form the first GC ranking.
The favourites for the stage will likely be Lidl-Trek, who won this equivalent stage last year, and will count on the power of riders like Ellen van Dijk, Riejanne Markus and Emma Norsgaard.
Demi Vollering's FDJ-Suez team are also one to keep an eye on, with some strong TT horsepower in Loes Adegeest and Vittoria Guazzini, and lots of motivation to take an initial lead in the GC they hope to control this week. Olympic team pursuit champion Chloé Dygert will also make for a threatening Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto effort.
For the smaller teams, who have very little time or need to practice team time trialing, Sunday will mainly be about getting round safely and not losing too much time in this rare discipline.
The racing kicks off at 12:51 local time (CEST) with Lotto Ladies rolling down the ramp, before FDJ-Suez close proceedings, starting an hour later at 13:51 CEST for what should be an effort of about ten minutes.
