Following the mountain stages of recent days, Tour de Romandie 2025 would conclude with a stage 5 individual time trial, which would be contested on a 17.1-kilometer route in the streets of Geneve. Though mainly contested in flat terrain, the time trial route did feature a hill, which would be climbed midway.

The time trial was expected to have a significant impact on the GC. Lenny Martinez was leading the general classification for Bahrain-Victorious before today’s final stage. The Frenchman was not known for his great time trialing abilities. Italian Lorenzo Fortunato was just two seconds behind the race leader, while UAE Team Emirates’ Joao Almeida and Jay Vine were third and fourth, respectively.

Placed last in the general classification, Denmark’s Johan Price-Pejtersen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) was the first rider to leave the start ramp in Geneve. The riders were starting the stage 5 time trial under cloudy skies. Temperatures were around nineteen degrees Celsius, but rain was expected later in the afternoon, which might influence the racing outcome if the riders did not finish the race before the rain set in.

Swiss rider Stefan Bissegger was racing on home turf and the time trial expect had been conserving his energy for today’s battle. The Decathlon-AG2R rider did, however, not deliver an impressive performance and would not even finish on the stage podium.

Denmark’s Kasper Asgreen delivered a respectable performance in today’s time trial following his move to EF Education-EasyPost before the start of the season and a spring, which had been dominated by illness. Asgreen finished fourth in the preliminary stage rankings.

Matthew Brennan, who had won a stage in this year’s Tour de Romandie, left the start ramp. The rider from Great Britain set a decent time at the intermediate timing point and even finished second-fastest when he crossed the finish line.

Time trial expert Remi Cavagna started his time trial. The Groupama-FDJ rider is known as the TGV train from Clermont-Ferrand because of his great speed on his time trial bike and in long solo breakaways. Cavagna set the fourth-best time at intermediate timing point 1 and finished in the second-best time when he crossed the finish line. The Frenchman was, however, one second slower than Price-Pejtersen’s finish time of 00:21:11.

Swiss rider Stefan Küng had high hopes for today’s time trial. The time trial expert had not performed optimally in the prologue and was hoping to get his vengeance on his time trial bike in today’s effort. The Groupama-FDJ rider had good legs and had been warming up well. His engines – and some time spent closely behind a motorcycle - delivered Küng the best time at the intermediate timing point. It had, however, started raining, and Küng was only third best at the finish line.

Thibaut Guernalec replaced Price-Pejtersen in the hot seat. The Arkea – B & B Hotels rider had raced the time trial route approximately four seconds faster than the Dane.

Alberto Bettiol set a new fastest time. Bettiol entered the hot seat and was ahead of Aleksandr Vlasov and Raul Garcia Pierna in the preliminary stage rankings.

Geraint Thomas started his time trial. The Welsh Ineos-Grenadiers rider had not been included in Ineos-Grenadiers’ roster for this year’s Giro d’Italia and now had the Tour de France as his major goal in his final season.

The riders from the top ten of the general classification were warming up and would soon be starting their individual time trials. 

Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) started his time trial wearing the World Champion jersey as time trial world champion. The Belgian rider was also Olympic Champion and therefore raced on a golden Specialized S-Works bike.

Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos-Grenadiers) and Jay Vine started their time trials. Joao Almeida was the next rider to leave the start ramp in Geneve.

Lorenzo Fortunato and general classification leader Lenny Martinez of Team Bahrain-Victorious were the last riders to start their time trials and initiate their rides through the narrow streets of Geneve.

Remco Evenepoel set a new fastest time at the intermediate timing point after approximately 11.5 kilometers of racing. The Belgian rider was eager to show his worth following a somewhat disappointing performance in this year’s Tour of Romandie, though he was still preparing for his major goals of the season.

Evenepoel also clocked a new fastest time when he crossed the finish line. Evenepoel was more than eighteen seconds faster than Bettiol and replaced the Italian rider in the hot seat.

Jay Vine was sixteen seconds slower than Evenepoel at the intermediate timing point. Vine’s teammate Joao Almeida was just eleven seconds behind Evenepoel at the timing point, but they would likely be unable to make up for their time deficits in the final kilometers before the finish line.

Almeida and Vine both proved unable to finish the time trial in a better time than leader Evenepoel. Almeida was eleven seconds slower and Vine almost 24 seconds slower.

Frenchman Lenny Martinez was delivering a surprisingly good performance on his time trial bike, despite time trials not being his favorite discipline. His bike handling skills from his MTB days were of great benefit in the narrow and curved streets with many corners. Martinez was 26 seconds slower than Evenepoel at the intermediate timing point. As Vine was sixteen seconds behind Evenepoel at the same point, it appeared Vine would surprisingly not be able to advance past Martinez in the general classification. 

Lenny Martinez finished thirteenth in the time trial. 

Remco Evenepoel won the stage 5 individual time trial of this year’s Tour de Romandie ahead of Joao Almeida, Alberto Bettiol, and Jay Vine.

Joao Almeida took the general classification victory in 16:50:44. Lenny Martinez finished second, 26 seconds behind the GC winner, while Jay Vine completed the GC podium.

“I am super happy with winning the general classification,” Tour de Romandie race winner Joao Almeida told Roadcycling.com after being celebrated on the podium in Geneve. 

“Of course I didn’t win a stage, but to be honest I was struggling all week, but I never gave up. My team was by my side to support me, and I am very grateful for their help. Today I had the good legs I needed. Now I will rest for a while and go on vacation, before I prepare for the rest of the season, which includes Tour de Suisse and the Tour de France,” Almeida explained.

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