Mischa Bredewold (SD Worx-Protime) won the 2026 Itzulia Women, closing the gap to a front group of seven riders in the streets of Donostia to defend her race lead.
Dominika Włodarczyk (UAE Team ADQ) won the final stage ahead of Évita Muzic and Lauren Dickson (both FDJ United-Suez), repeating her stage win from stage 2.
The yellow jersey was dropped on the Mendizorrotz climb in the final of stage 3 and was 30 seconds behind a front group of seven riders with 10km. Bredewold shot down the descent, and in the final kilometre, she made it back to the front group and still sprinted to sixth place on the stage.
Yara Kastelijn (Fenix-Premier Tech) finished second in GC ahead of Dickson, both 21 seconds behind Bredewold.
"It’s making me emotional. The support from the team was incredible. I really started to believe I could do it today because they really believed in me. I’m very, very happy to take this victory," said Bredewold after the podium ceremony where she received the customary txapela hat.
This is Bredewold's first overall win in the race where she's won five stages over the years, but always lost the lead on the harder, final stage, but she finally managed to avoid that today with a valiant battle to defend her overall placing.
"Last year, I overpaced myself on the climb in the beginning. I knew that was my biggest enemy today. Friday, I felt a little bit better on the climb [than today], but I was struggling with position. I thought that if I take over, with the headwind it’s going to cost me too much energy, so I really had to pace it," Bredewold described the climb before reliving the whirlwind final 10km.
"I saw the gap was not too big, and I knew the flatter part and then the technical descent is my part. When I came down, I saw them, and I had only one goal. I don’t think I dug this deep in my life before, I almost fainted behind the podium just now. But we made it," she finished.
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Włodarczyk secured the stage 3 victory in a reduced sprint (Image credit: Getty Images)
How it unfolded
The final stage started and finished in Donostia, and the 113.1km course included several uncategorised hills and three classified climbs: The famous Jaizkibel followed by the third-category Gurutze before the climb to Mendizorrotz cresting with 10.1km to go would decide the race.
Despite several attempts, no breakaway could establish itself early on, and Kastelijn took maximum points on the Jaizkibel to secure the mountain jersey.
Loes Adegeest (Lidl-Trek) and Léa Curinier (FDJ United-Suez) attacked on the Gurutze climb but were reeled in again on the descent. Nadia Quagliotto (Cofidis), Yuliia Biriukova, and Paula Patiño (both Laboral Kutxa-Fundación Euskadi) all launched attacks on the flat part that followed, but Movistar and SD Worx-Protime did not let anybody stay off the front for long as they targeted the two intermediate sprints.
Movistar were policing things for Lippert (Image credit: Getty Images)
Liane Lippert (Movistar) beat Bredewold in the first one with Włodarczyk taking the remaining bonus second, but Bredewold pipped Lippert to the second intermediate sprint where Usoa Ostolaza was third.
With the intermediate sprints out of the way, an attack by Nina Buijsman (Human Powered Health) got the green light. She built a 50-second gap with 20km to go, and Morgane Coston (Ma Petite Entreprise) chased in between but was caught again as the peloton started the lead-out into the Mendizorrotz climb.
Buijsman was also caught at the bottom of the climb, and FDJ United-Suez started the action with an attack by Juliette Berthet that was closed down by Antonia Niedermaier (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto). After a brief stint from Riejanne Markus (Lidl-Trek), Niedermaier took over and set a hard pace, slowly but surely reducing the size of the group.
Lippert lost contact after a third of the climb, and Bredewold also had to let a gap open but stayed in control by riding her own pace. Up front, Dickson tried to attack but slotted in behind Niedermaier again.
Eventually, a gap opened behind Niedermaier, Kastelijn, Berthet, and Włodarczyk, though Dickson quickly returned, and Muzic and Ostolaza also made it back to the front on the less steep second half of the climb.
Berthet accelerated with 1.6km to go to the top to set up an attack by Dickson, but Niedermaier quickly closed the 26-year-old’s move down and then rode tempo at the front of the group again.
Bredewold had joined forces with the Lidl-Trek duo of Markus and Ricarda Bauernfeind, and they crested the climb 30 seconds.
Bredewold joined the Lidl-Trek duo to try and get back on (Image credit: Getty Images)
In the descent, Dickson and Muzic unsuccessfully tried to get away from the front group while Bredewold threw herself down the winding road, even dropping Markus and Bauernfeind in her chase and reducing the gap to eight seconds after the downhill.
The last 3.5km along the beachfront and through the streets of Donostia saw attacks by Dickson and Berthet that came to nothing, and at the flamme rouge, Bauernfeind and Bredewold were only six seconds behind.
Dickson attacked one last time on the final kilometre, but Niedermaier closed the gap, and in Bauernfeind’s slipstream, Bredewold and Markus made it back to the front group just after turning onto the finishing straight.
Włodarczyk launched her sprint at the 200-metre mark, and although Muzic pulled alongside her, the Pole fought back to take her second consecutive stage while Dickson pipped Ostolaza to fourth place.
Włodarczyk wins the sprint (Image credit: Getty Images)
On top of the GC victory, Bredewold also won the points classification. Ema Comte (Cofidis) finished 19th overall to win the U23 jersey, and FDJ United-Suez won the team classification.
Lukas Knöfler started working in cycling communications in 2013 and has seen the inside of the scene from many angles. Having worked as press officer for teams and races and written for several online and print publications, he has been Cyclingnews’ Women’s WorldTour correspondent since 2018.
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