This Sunday, April 26, the exhausted, battered remains of the professional peloton will line up for the 112th edition of Liège-Bastogne-Liège. Known as La Doyenne (“The Old Lady”), it is the oldest Monument on the calendar, and it treats its participants with absolute, unyielding cruelty.
If Amstel Gold is about positioning and Flèche Wallonne is about a three-minute anaerobic sprint, Liège is simply a 250-kilometer war of physical attrition. It is where the puncheurs go to die and the Grand Tour contenders come out to play.
Here is everything you need to know before the peloton rolls out of the Meuse valley.
The Liège-Bastogne-Liège Route: 250 Kilometers of Relentless Walloon Suffering
Do not let the name fool you. The ride south from Liège to Bastogne is essentially a 100-kilometer warm-up. The actual race doesn’t begin until the peloton turns around and heads back north into a terrifying, jagged sawtooth profile of Ardennes climbs.
The men’s route covers roughly 255 kilometers and features over 4,000 meters of elevation gain. The women tackle 150 kilometers with the same brutal finale. The race is almost entirely defined by the final 35 kilometers, which feature two iconic, race-shattering ascents:
- Côte de La Redoute: This is the traditional launchpad. It is 1.6 kilometers long, averaging over 9%, with ramps hitting 20%. The crowds here are deafening, the air smells entirely of stale beer and frites, and this is where the major favorites will ignite the first massive tactical explosions.
- Côte de la Roche-aux-Faucons: Arriving just 13 kilometers from the finish line in Liège, “Falcon’s Rock” is the final nail in the coffin. It is 1.3 kilometers at 11%, but the true torture is the false flat that follows the summit. If a rider is dangling off the back here, they will never see the front of the race again.
Ones to Watch: Who Will Win the Men’s 2026 Liège-Bastogne-Liège?
2026 Liège-Bastogne-Liège startlist. After an injury-depleted Amstel Gold and a Flèche Wallonne won by a teenager, the true heavyweights have finally returned to the ring. This is the heavyweight Monument clash we have been waiting for all spring.
Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) The Slovenian has been resting his legs, focusing on claiming another Doyenne title. When Pogačar attacks on La Redoute, the laws of aerodynamics and human physiology simply bend to his will.
Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) Fresh off signing his completely unhinged lifetime contract with Specialized, the Olympic Champion is hunting for his third Liège victory. He skipped Flèche Wallonne after winning Amstel Gold to ensure he is perfectly peaked for Sunday. We finally get to see Evenepoel go head-to-head with Pogačar on terrain that suits them both perfectly.
Paul Seixas (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) The 19-year-old French prodigy just embarrassed the entire WorldTour peloton on the Mur de Huy on Wednesday. Liège is a completely different, infinitely more exhausting beast, but after that Flèche Wallonne performance, don’t count him out.
Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) With Tom Pidcock and Ben Healy still recovering from their respective ravines and broken pelvises, Skjelmose is the best of the rest. He has the engine to survive the distance and a strong sprint if a small group makes it to the flat finish in Liège.
The Women’s Race Preview: Vollering’s Vengeance
2026 Liège-Bastogne-Liège startlist.
The women’s 150-kilometer race promises to be an absolute tactical slugfest.
Demi Vollering (FDJ United-Suez) has officially restored order to the universe. After winning Flanders and crushing everyone on the Mur de Huy on Wednesday, she is one win away from completing an utterly dominant spring campaign. She is defending her Liège title, and right now, she looks untouchable.
Her former team, SD Worx-Protime, is in full panic mode. Lotte Kopecky will attempt to survive the brutal gradients of La Redoute, but the team’s best bet might actually be Mischa Bredewold or Lorena Wiebes anticipating the attacks and trying to sneak up the road before Vollering drops the hammer.
Also, watch out for Katarzyna Niewiadoma (Canyon//SRAM) and Elisa Longo Borghini (Lidl-Trek), both of whom possess the exact type of relentless, grinding climbing engines required to conquer the Roche-aux-Faucons.
Nerd Corner: Liège-Bastogne-Liège Trivia
- The Hometown Hero: Liège-Bastogne-Liège runs directly through the hometown of retired Belgian legend Philippe Gilbert. In his prime, the crowds on La Redoute painted “PHIL” on the asphalt hundreds of times. Even though he has been retired for years, you can still see the faded white paint underneath the tires of the current peloton.
- The Weather Roulette: Liège is notorious for having the most bipolar weather in professional cycling. The 1980 edition was won by Bernard Hinault in a blizzard that forced half the peloton to abandon with hypothermia. This Sunday looks relatively dry, but in the Ardennes, you should always pack a rain cape.
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How to Watch Liège-Bastogne-Liège 2026
We’ll have race highlights of the men’s and women’s races available for free on Cyclry TV, so you can catch up on the race in a quick eight minutes of your life. Tune in at some point after the race ends. ASO is usually quick to get it to us.
- United States: Peacock
- United Kingdom: TNT Sports / HBO Max
- Canada: FloBikes
- Australia: SBS
- More Civilized Countries: On a flickering CRT TV in a smoky tabac. And on your local TV channels.
We don’t know what time each of those broadcasts starts. They’ll all be taking the international signal though, so you can reverse engineer it for your locale if one of them has updated their schedule.