Giro d’Italia Women

The Giro d'Italia Women is a multi-stage bike race held across Italy each late spring or early summer. First run in 1988, it has grown into the women's peloton's most sustained stage racing challenge, typically spanning eight to ten days with mountain, time trial, and transition stages that reward consistency and climbing strength.

The Giro d’Italia Women is Italy’s stage race for the pink jersey, held since 1988 and long known as the Giro Donne or Giro Rosa. Fabiana Luperini’s five overall wins are the record. Two Dutch riders have won four, and in 2026 one of them lost a fifth on the last climb of the race.

How many stages are in the Giro d’Italia Women?

The 2026 Giro d’Italia Women had nine stages on nine consecutive days, from May 30 to June 7. One of them was an individual time trial, from Belluno up to Nevegal.

Maria Canins and the first women’s Giro in 1988

Maria Canins won the first edition in 1988. Roberta Bonanomi won in 1989 and Michela Fanini in 1994, before Luperini’s run began. Winners from abroad followed: Joane Somarriba of Spain in 1999 and 2000, Nicole Brändli of Switzerland in 2001, 2003 and 2005, and Edita Pučinskaitė of Lithuania in 2006 and 2007.

Fabiana Luperini’s five wins, ten years apart

Luperini won four Giros in a row from 1995 to 1998. Her fifth came in 2008, ten years after the fourth. She won 15 stages of the race along the way, and three editions of the Tour Cycliste, the French women’s stage race of those years. Her career began at 19 and ended at 40.

Her name is on most of the race’s big climbs. In 1997 she won alone on Monte Zoncolan, the first time the women climbed it. She won on Monte Serra in 1998 on the way to her fourth title, and won there again in 2008 on the way to her fifth.

Mara Abbott’s attack on the Stelvio in 2010

Mara Abbott took her first Giro stage on Monte Serra in 2009, at 23, and finished second overall. In 2010 the queen stage climbed the full 24 kilometers of the Passo dello Stelvio, and Abbott was already leading the race. She attacked in the last 3 kilometers and finished 27 seconds ahead of Emma Pooley. Abbott won the Giro that year and again in 2013. Marianne Vos won the other editions of those years, in 2011, 2012 and 2014. In 2016 Abbott attacked on the Mortirolo and rode alone to the finish and into the pink jersey, but her compatriot Megan Guarnier won that Giro.

Van Vleuten and Van der Breggen: eight wins in nine years

Anna van der Breggen won in 2015, 2017, 2020 and 2021, and Annemiek van Vleuten in 2018, 2019, 2022 and 2023. Between 2015 and 2023 only Guarnier interrupted them. With Vos’s three wins and Vollering’s in 2026, Dutch riders have won twelve editions, more than any other country.

In 2020 Van Vleuten was leading when she crashed on stage 7 and broke her wrist. Van der Breggen took the pink jersey the next day, finishing second to Elisa Longo Borghini at San Marco la Catola. She won the Giro for the third time, ahead of Kasia Niewiadoma and Longo Borghini. On the last stage, at Motta Montecorvino, the 21-year-old Évita Muzic won from the breakaway for her first Women’s WorldTour victory.

Van Vleuten’s fourth win came in 2023, her last season. The opening time trial was canceled because of extreme weather, and she rode alone over the Passo della Colla on stage 2 to take the first pink jersey of the race. She won her fourth title a week later in Olbia.

Longo Borghini’s one-second lead in 2024

RCS Sport, which runs the men’s Giro, took over the race in 2024 and gave it its present name. Its first route went over the Blockhaus, where Neve Bradbury won alone. Longo Borghini won that edition at her 13th attempt and led it from the first stage, a time trial in Brescia, to the last.

She started the final stage to L’Aquila one second ahead of Lotte Kopecky. Kim Le Court won the stage from the breakaway. Behind, Longo Borghini followed Kopecky on the Acquasanta climb 4 kilometers from the finish, sprinted away from her in the finishing straight and won the Giro by 21 seconds. She was the first Italian winner since Luperini.

A year later she won again, without a stage win. Marlen Reusser wore the pink jersey into the second-last day, when Longo Borghini attacked on a descent with her teammate Silvia Persico before the climb of Monte Nerone and took the jersey. She won by 18 seconds. Luperini is the only other Italian to have won the race more than once.

Vollering takes the 2026 Giro on the last climb

Van der Breggen had come out of a three-year retirement in 2025. In 2026 she started the last of nine stages in the pink jersey, 50 seconds ahead of Demi Vollering, and a fifth win would have matched Luperini’s record. The day before, an avalanche had shortened the stage over the Colle delle Finestre by 28.5 kilometers, and Vollering had won at a finish line moved to about a kilometer below the top.

On the final stage around Saluzzo, Antonia Niedermaier attacked 80 kilometers from the finish, and Longo Borghini and Niamh Fisher-Black joined her. Vollering attacked a kilometer from the top of the last climb, the Colletta di Brondello, and Van der Breggen could not follow. She reached the three leaders 28 kilometers from the finish. Longo Borghini won the stage, and Vollering won the Giro by 30 seconds from Niedermaier, with Van der Breggen third. Vollering is the second woman, after Van Vleuten, to have won all three Grand Tours.

This is the race where the women's peloton gets the closest thing to Grand Tour duration. The length matters: riders must survive crashes, recover between hard days, and manage form across more than a week of racing. The route typically builds toward high mountains in the final days, and the winner needs both climbing legs and the resilience to stay upright and healthy through the opening stages. Recent editions have featured compelling duels between pure climbers and stronger all-rounders, with time trials and summit finishes each playing a role.