The Angliru Changes Everything for Women’s Cycling

The Angliru is renowned for its brutal steeps as one of cycling’s most savage climbs. Riders have called its 20-percent-plus grades cycling’s ultimate test of suffering.

On Saturday, for the first time, the women’s peloton will confront its myth and menace during La Vuelta Femenina.

Set to cap the 2026 edition with the final stage, cycling’s most feared climb is setting up what organizers are calling a “celebration of a new era in women’s cycling.”

One rider relishing the looming pain is Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, the Tour de France Femmes defending champion who’s poised to add La Vuelta to her growing palmarès.

“I’m looking forward to do this climb. It’s a mythic climb. It’s going to be very hard there,” Ferrand-Prévot told Velo. “I don’t know what to expect, so we will see.”

La Vuelta’s final stage on Saturday will be this edition’s longest and most demanding stage.

The colossal climb of the Angliru will decide the final winner of this year’s edition.

Ferrand-Prévot comes into La Vuelta winless so far in 2026, but that could change soon.

La Vuelta tackles its first summit finish Friday, and after podiums at the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix Femmes this spring, she seems overdue for a win.

“I think already [Friday] we can have an idea of the GC classification,” she said ahead of Thursday’s stage. “I’m feeling every day better, so we have to see how I feel on the longer climbs. I’m feeling good, but I also don’t know how the others are feeling.”

The brutal steeps of the monster of Spain often see racers roll out mountain bike gearing and Ferrand-Prévot — who stunned the peloton last year with back-to-back summit win in the French Alps last year at the Tour de France Femmes — is bracing for a brutal day.

“For sure we need to have the good gearing to climb, and we have the best setup, so I’m not afraid about that,” she said.

Colossus of the north

Introduced in 1999, the Alto de l’Angliru was one of cycling’s first “impossible” climbs, and instantly become one of cycling’s most feared.

The 12.4km ascent averages 9.7 percent, with brutal ramps pitching to 23 percent and extended sections above 15 percent. The 1,200 meters of vertical gain make it one of cycling’s most searing and demanding climbs.

Some doubts lingered that the Angliru might be too extreme for the women’s peloton, but La Vuelta organizers say the peloton’s proven beyond any doubt it can handle cycling’s most demanding climbs.

“It’s very empowering that the organizers believe we can do such a crazy, brutal climb,” said Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney, the 2024 Tour de France Femmes winner, on LaVuelta.com. “The difference will be made by how long you can suffer and ignore the pain.”

La Vuelta Femenina has already routed the peloton onto such iconic climbs such as the Lagos de Covadonga and Lagunas de Neila in recent editions.

With the inclusion this year of the Angliru, the moment is seen as the next step in the evolution of women’s racing and parity across the sport.

‘If the men climb it, why not?’

La Vuelta is set to change gears Friday, with a sharp, first-category summit finish in Asturias.

After nearly a week of sprints, the legs will sting. Overnight leader Lotte Kopecky knows her time in red is numbered.

SD Worx-Protime will be hoping to pass it along to teammate Anna van der Breggen.

Van der Breggen has had a solid season in her the second year of her comeback after a three-year hiatus, and is poised to move up this weekend.

Last year, she won a stage at La Vuelta, and finished third overall behind Demi Vollering and Marlen Reuser.

Neither one of them are back, so she knows Friday’s summit finale and Saturday’s historic climb up the Angliru will decide everything.

“I think everybody’s looking forward to Angliru climb. I know it’s going to be really tough, so hopefully I have a good day on the climb,” Van der Breggen told Velo.

Van der Breggen knows about climbing steep walls, most famously the Mur de Huy at La Flèche Wallonne, which she won a record seven times.

She also knows the Angliru is something else altogether.

“We haven’t really seen these longer climbs yet. I’ve been on steep climbs like that before, like at the Mur de Huy, but this is a bit longer,” she said with a laugh. “We will be using different gearing. I think we will know more [Friday] about who is climbing well.”

Along with Niewiadoma-Phinney and rising Spanish star Paula Blasi, the peloton’s top climbing stars will be pushing for the honor to be the first winner up one of Europe’s most notorious climbs.

And what about the hype surrounding climbing cycling’s most fearsome summit?

Ferrand-Prévot was matter of fact about the historic moment.

“Why not? If the men are doing it, why we should not?” the French star told Velo.