The 2025 Vuelta a España will go down in history as a fraught affair, defined as much by events off the bike as by the racing. Slow-simmering disquiet about the presence of Israel-Premier Tech at the race boiled over as the race dragged on; the last week of the race was beset by increasingly disruptive pro-Palestine protests, with the final stage of the race into Madrid neutralised and then cancelled altogether. After three weeks of racing around an entire country, the Vuelta’s last gasp was a tweet: "for security reasons, stage 21 of La Vuelta has been ended early. There will be no podium ceremony."
"No podium ceremony"? Sort of, but not really. A stage and assorted infrastructure had been set up at the Cibeles Fountain in the centre of Madrid, where crowds of thousands thronged to watch a bike race that would never pass, and that ceremony never happened, it’s true. But the moment did not go completely unmarked.
After night had fallen, at the Visma-Lease a Bike hotel, an alternative celebration was in the works.
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