Lorenzo Finn wins the Tour de l’Avenir 2026! He is the first Italian cyclist to triumph after over half a century

Italian cycling finds its king of the great youth stage races again. Lorenzo Finn, a nineteen-year-old from Liguria for Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe Rookies, won the 62nd edition of the Tour de l’Avenir, completing a feat that had been missing for Italy for 53 years. In the last stage of 127.8 kilometres, started from Strambino and concluded at an altitude of 2275 meters at Ceresole Reale-Lago Serrù, the Under 23 world champion pulled away from everyone with an irresistible progression in the last two kilometers of the climb. Arriving at the finish line with his arms raised, lifting his bicycle, the Italian sublimated a perfect week, preceding the Belgian Niels Driesen by 27 seconds and mortgaging the general classification with a margin of over two and a half minutes.

The decisive attack on Lake Serrù and the numbers of the race

The final stage saw the initial breakaway of four pacesetters, including Timothée Coudière-Cantin and Ashlin Barry, reabsorbed before the final ramps thanks to the control work of the German team. When the road began to rise towards an altitude of two thousand metres, the Colombian Mateo Ramírez attempted to push forward, but Lorenzo Finn immediately responded to the wheel.

Three kilometers from the pass, the Italian rider stood up on the pedals and launched the decisive solitary attack. In the general ranking, Lorenzo Finn finished with a total time of 21h 56′ 50″, trailing Niels Driesen of Lotto Groupe Wanty by 2’34” and the other Belgian Matteo Vanhuffel of Development Team Picnic PostNL by 3’42”.

A historic double that recalls the myth of Gianbattista Baronchelli

To find an Italian rider capable of wearing the final yellow jersey at the Tour de l’Avenir, one had to go back to 1973, the year of Gianbattista Baronchelli’s success. Before him, only monuments of the discipline such as Guido De Rosso in 1961, Felice Gimondi in 1964 and Mino Denti in 1966 had managed to enter their names in the roll of honor.

Furthermore, Finn joins Baronchelli as the only athlete in history capable of achieving the Giro Next Gen and Tour de l’Avenir double in the same competitive season. A winning streak that began with the youth world championship gold in Rwanda and was also enriched in the summer by the first professional achievement achieved at the Sibiu Tour.

From Flaine’s time trial to the passage among the greats

Lorenzo Finn’s triumphal march in the transalpine race was constructed with tactical clarity. After defending himself from the winds in the first stage in Normandy by placing third, the Italian made his final breakthrough in the fifth stage, dominating the 11 kilometer time trial towards the Col de la Pierre Carré in Flaine. With the final success at the Tour de l’Avenir, the Ligurian talent takes up the legacy of the Frenchman Paul Seixas and is moving towards commitments with the senior national team for the next European and world championships. Has the future of Italian cycling found its new guiding star?