UAE Team Emirates XRG rider Isaac del Toro won the 2026 UAE Tour on Sunday after safely defending his overall lead on the seventh and final stage in Abu Dhabi.
The Mexican finished ahead of Italy’s Antonio Tiberi, with Australia’s Luke Plapp completing the podium places.
The final stage ended in a bunch sprint finish, where Italy’s Jonathan Milan took the line – his third stage win of the race. Norway’s Erlend Blikra and Australia’s Sam Welsford completed the top three in the capital.
"It's pretty special, honestly. Thanks [to] the team this was possible and I'm super happy with the guys, really," said Del Toro. "They helped me a lot and I cannot be more proud about this.
"It was a great feeling [riding through Abu Dhabi on Sunday], this city, also when we were in Dubai was pretty special. I will remember this race."
Asked what's next, he added: "Probably I need to stay at home a little bit. Then I go to Australia, to Terrano Atletico. So we do this as the first step."
Del Toro’s overall success was effectively secured on Saturday when he put in a record-breaking display during the sixth stage, a summit finish at Jebel Hafeet.
The 22-year-old attacked late to seal both the stage and the red jersey as the general classification leader. He then safely navigated Sunday's finale from Zayed National Museum to Abu Dhabi Breakwater to wrap up the biggest stage-race win of his career so far.
Del Toro had started Saturday's Stage 6 from Al Ain Museum 21 seconds behind Tiberi in the general classification but with confidence still high that the gap could be overturned.
Ahead of the stage, Del Toro made clear he was ready “to fight for the win” and that he felt in great shape going into the crucial battle on Jebel Hafeet.
Tiberi admitted he was “curious to see how UAE want to play their cards” in terms of when they would go on the attack. “Del Toro will try some attacks, because, I mean, he has 21 seconds to make up, so he has to do something,” said Tiberi, who took over the red jersey after winning Wednesday's Stage 3 on Jebel Mobrah.
As it turned out, the attack came with over 3km to go on the 168km stage leaving Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious) desperately hanging on to the Mexican's tail with Plapp (Team Jayco AlUla) also fighting back to stay in the hunt.
But when Del Toro increased the pace again with 2.5km left, Tiberi and Plapp could not keep up, with the Italian eventually finishing down in fourth behind second-placed Plapp and Austria's Felix Gall (Decathlon CMA CGM Team) who came home third. It was a landmark performance from rising star Del Toro who took a 20-second buffer into Sunday.
During the week, UAE Team Emirates XRG's chief operating officer Andrea Agostini told The National that Del Toro is “not the future, he's the present” calling his talent “something special”.
That certainly proved to be the case in the UAE Tour as the Giro d'Italia runner-up stepped into the spotlight vacated this year by his teammate and three-time winner Tadej Pogacar with some panache after also claiming victory on Stage 1.
“This is just a mentality game, that you can be confident enough to keep trying and, of course, if one time it doesn't work, you still need to have it in your head that you're able to do it,” Del Toro said of the timing of his attacks on Stage 6.
