<\/div>\n
Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious) rode a long and painful time trial up the brutal Jebel Mobrah climb to win stage 3 of the UAE Tour and move into the lead of the race.<\/p>\n
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Isaac del Toro (UAE Emirates-XRG) finished second on the sprawling, sunbaked summit Wednesday after he launched a huge late chase across its grueling 12 percent ramps.<\/p>\n
The 22-year-old plowed through the scattered peloton after he had initially appeared out of position but fell 15 seconds short of catching Tiberi and his climbing masterclass.<\/p>\n
Former UAE Tour champion Lennert van Eetvelt (Lotto-Intermarch\u00e9) came across third.<\/p>\n
Overnight race leader and pre-race favorite Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) cracked on the unforgiving slopes and hemorrhaged more than two minutes on what was easily the toughest climb of the season so far.<\/p>\n
It was a savage turnaround for the 26-year-old after he unleashed a time trialing storm only 24 hours earlier.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the foot of the climb, I already had cramps coming on,\u201d Evenepoel told Het Nieuwsblad<\/em> at the finish. \u201cThat\u2019s something I haven\u2019t experienced often. Maybe from yesterday\u2019s effort, which I hadn\u2019t fully recovered from.<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t have the best night either. I woke up from the heat,\u201d he said. \u201cBut ultimately, I can\u2019t make excuses.\u201d<\/p>\n Wednesday\u2019s Jebel Mobrah summit finish had been touted as one of the toughest ascents of the entire pro calendar.<\/p>\n The unprecedented climb sprawls across 15km of sun-parched tarmac and reaches boiling point with a heinous 7km, 12 percent finale.<\/p>\n The tarmac wall did the expected damage.<\/p>\n Evenepoel\u2019s first true climbing test as a Red Bull rider delivered a ruthless verdict as the Belgian appeared to overheat and then went backward.<\/p>\n Only Del Toro is within a minute of Tiberi on GC after the huge climbing shakeup on Wednesday.<\/p>\n Top climbers Adam Yates (UAE Emirates-XRG), Michael Storer (Tudor), and Ben O\u2019Connor (Jayco-AlUla) all lost time.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The hardest climb ever used in a UCI race in February? \ud83e\uddd0\ud83d\ude31 Tomorrow, the riders of UAE Tour go for the first time on Jebel Mobrah with the last 7 km averaging 12%. Good night! #UAETour pic.twitter.com\/zHeKtSurXh<\/p>\n \u2014 Mihai Simion (@faustocoppi60) February 17, 2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n It was some win for Tiberi.<\/p>\n The Italian never won at WorldTour level until he completed his six-kilometer attack Wednesday.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been dreaming of a victory like this since I turned pro,\u201d Tiberi said at the finish. \u201cNow it\u2019s finally happened. I\u2019ve felt good since the start of the season. I\u2019ve been waiting for this day. Finally, it happened today.<\/p>\n \u201cI was among the first to attack. I saw Remco lose a few meters, and Del Toro wasn\u2019t there either. So I thought maybe this is a good day for me, but maybe they\u2019re waiting for the finale,\u201d Tiberi said. \u201cStill, I rode my own race. I attacked and kept riding as hard as I could until the finish.\u201d<\/p>\n Tiberi now stands to hold the red leader\u2019s jersey until his climbing chops are tested again on Saturday\u2019s summit finish to Jebel Hafeet.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/velo.outsideonline.com\/road\/road-racing\/uae-tour-evenepoel-cracks-tiberi-takes-control\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/velo.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Copy-of-VLAB-2.jpeg”] Jim Cotton Updated February 18, 2026 08:36AM Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious) rode a long and painful time trial up the brutal Jebel Mobrah climb to win stage 3 of the UAE Tour and move into the lead of the race. Isaac del Toro (UAE Emirates-XRG) finished second on the sprawling, sunbaked summit […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[226,71],"class_list":["post-1779212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-crawlmanager","tag-velo-outsideonline-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1779212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1779212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1779212\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1779212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1779212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1779212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Jebel Mobrah delivers cruel early-season test<\/h2>\n
![\"Evenepoel](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2262286002-1200x800.jpg?width=3840&auto=webp&quality=75&fit=cover\")
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Tiberi picks his moment for first WorldTour win<\/h2>\n
![\"Tim](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2262284751-1200x800.jpg?width=3840&auto=webp&quality=75&fit=cover\")