On the third stage of the 2026 Tour de Suisse, the riders faced a mix of mountain and flat stages: two Category 1 climbs and plenty of elevation gain were on the cards in the first half of the stage, before the route became almost entirely flat over the final 60 kilometres. A terrain tailor-made for a breakaway group. After 157.9 kilometres, the stage victory in Bad Ragaz went to Jhonatan Narváez (UAE – Emirates – XRG).
Feld misses the breakaway by a few bike lengths
He beat his teammate Xandro Meurisse (Pinarello) in a two-man sprint. Both riders had led the peloton as a duo for over 100 kilometres. However, it soon became clear that Narváez was the stronger of the two riders. The Ecuadorian did most of the work at the front and once again demonstrated his strength as a steady-paced rider with good sprinting ability.
Just a few bike lengths later, Magnus Cort (Uno-X Mobility) crossed the finish line in third place. Marijn van den Berg (EF Education EasyPost) and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) followed in the next places. In the final stretch, the peloton and the two breakaway riders battled it out for every second – with the breakaway riders coming out on top.
In the overall standings, Tadej Pogačar is in first place, 2 minutes and 50 seconds ahead of Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost). Andrea Bagioli (Lidl-Trek) is in third place, 3 minutes and 7 seconds behind.
Tour de Suisse 2026 – Stage 3 results
Here’s how the third stage of the 2026 Tour de Suisse unfolded:
As expected, the mountainous first half of the stage caused chaos amongst the day’s breakaway group. Time and again, riders broke away, only to be reeled back in shortly afterwards. At one point, a 16-strong leading group seemed to have a good chance, but in the end it was probably too full of big names. After all, it included riders such as Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull – Bora – hansgrohe), Mikel Landa (Soudal – Quick Step) and Enric Mas (Movistar).
Schachmann and Brenner among the breakaway riders
After 40 kilometres, however, Jhonatan Narváez (UAE - Emirates - XRG) and Xandro Meurisse (Pinarello) managed to break away, followed by a chasing group including Vlasov, Barkel Beloki (EF Education EasyPost), Emiel Verstrynge (Alpecin Deceuninck), Simon Dalby (Uno-X Mobility), Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious), Michal Kwiatkowski (INEOS Netcompany), Ewen Costiou (Groupama FDJ) and the two Germans Marco Brenner (Tudor) and Maximilian Schachmann (Soudal Quick Step). The peloton let the riders go and was soon more than four minutes behind.
However, the chasing group failed to close the gap on the leading duo. On the contrary: their two-minute deficit soon grew to over three minutes behind Narváez and Meurisse. The gap actually widened further, even though Meurisse briefly came off his chain and Narváez had to wait for him. However, no constructive cooperation materialised within the chasing group. With 48 kilometres to go, the remaining riders in the group – which had originally consisted of eleven – were caught.
In the meantime, a storm with heavy rain rolled in, but it quickly passed. From then on, it was a battle between the Visma | Lease a Bike, NSN and EF Education EasyPost teams and the two breakaway riders. With 45 kilometres to go, the gap stood at 3 minutes and 15 seconds. Narváez and Meurisse proved tenacious, however: even 20 kilometres from the finish, their lead still stood at 1:40 minutes.
But the peloton was closing the gap second by second. Eight kilometres from the finish, the lead dropped below the one-minute mark. To make matters worse, it started to rain in the final stretch.
