There will be 126 riders representing 24 nationalities who will animate the 4th O Gran Camino, a Spanish race edition that is already historic in its own way, with the addition of an extra race day compared to previous years and the first-ever start from neighboring Portugal.

In this context rich with novelties, absent will be the one who, in the last two seasons, has been the absolute master of the event along with his team, namely Jonas Vingegaard. The two-time Tour winner has this year preferred the roads of Volta ao Algarve to those of the Spanish event for his (victorious) debut, which will ensure that his vacant throne will have a new owner on Sunday.

However, it cannot be ruled out that his successor, in a sort of Danish relay, might be another subject of King Frederik, namely Magnus Cort, a rider who, as demonstrated by his victory at the Arctic Race of Norway last year, knows how to win races of this type. The 1993 rider from Rønne will be part of a very competitive Uno-X Mobility roster, which includes two other names who could equally successfully manage the overall classification, such as Fredrik Dversnes and Johannes Kulset, both on the podium at the Alula Tour earlier this month.

If the Scandinavian team will not lack elements to perform well in Spain, the same can be said for Israel-Premier Tech, which by fielding Simon Clarke, Hugo Houle, Marco Frigo, Jakob Fuglsang, and a young rider ready to take another step like Derek Gee, can certainly aim for the big target without disdaining partial achievements.

On this front, it will be interesting to see how the only three World Tour teams at the start, Groupama-FDJ, Movistar, and Soudal-Quick Step, will perform, which for the occasion have all chosen to mix youth and experience by pairing more experienced profiles with rising talents or riders still in development teams. In the Belgian team, for example, Mauri Vansevenant, James Knox and Jordi Warlop will be supported by Servranckx, Soenens and the Italians Thomas Pesenti and Federico Savino; in the Spanish team (the last to bring an Iberian rider to win a stage in 2022), the exuberance of Diego Pescador, Jefferson Cepeda and Carlos Canal will combine with the wisdom of Jorge Arcas and Antonio Pedrero, while in the French team, the qualities of Remy Rochas and Matthew Walls will merge with the freshness of Decomble, Daumas, Bock and Nilsson-Julien.

Years in the group and the engine are not lacking for Mirco Maestri, director of a Polti VisitMalta that will try to satisfy itself by focusing on the duo Davide Piganzoli-Giovanni Lonardi, supported in this circumstance by Diego Sevilla, Fernando Tercero, and the compatriots Andrea Pietrobon and Alessandro Tonelli. Speaking of Italians (16 in total at the start), the VF Group-Bardiani CSF-Faizan will be entirely Italian-powered, entrusting its glory dreams to Luca Covili, Filippo Magli, Martin Marcellusi, Alex Tolio, Luca Paletti, Filippo Turconi and Matteo Scalco, while Filippo D'Aiuto, with Petrolike (where the name of former EF rider Jonathan Caicedo must be kept an eye on), completes a national group that, overall, will be the third best represented in the entire event.

Only the Portuguese contingent with 22 standard-bearers and the Spanish one, strong with 44 units thanks to the presence of all four Iberian ProTeams (Equipo Kern Pharma by Urko Berrade, Burgos-Burpellet-BH by Fagundez and Sainbayar, Caja Rural-Seguros RGA by Balderstone and Peñuela, and Euskaltel-Euskadi by Jordi Lopez) and the Continental Illes Balears Arabay, will be more numerous than the Italian one, a fact that is hoped will be a good omen for the riders from the Peninsula who have never, in the history of the race, managed to win a stage or even close the general classification on the podium.