Chris Froome, Simon Yates and Thibaut Pinot headline Tour of the Alps 2021

Thibaut Pinot, Simon Yates and Chris Froome are among the headlines names at this year's Tour of the Alps.

Returning to the calendar after the 2020 edition was cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic, the peloton will race over the mountains of northern Italy and southern Austria, as some prepare for the upcoming Giro d'Italia.

13,000 metres of climbing feature across the five days of racing, three stages including category one climbs along its route.

Ineos Grenadiers' Pavel Sivakov is present to defend his title, having won in 2019 ahead of team-mate Tao Geoghegan Hart.

The British rider isn't present at this year's race, not defending his maglia rosa in May, instead set to race his debut Tour de France in July, but another Brit in the shape of Hugh Carthy will be taking the start line at the Tour of Alps (prior to the Italian Grand Tour) alongside EF - Nippo team-mates Lachlan Morton and Tejay Van Garderen.

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Ineos' line-up also includes Dani Martínez and Iván Sosa, while fellow Colombian Nairo Quintana leads Arkéa-Samsic's delegation.

Chris Froome will be working for Israel Start-Up Nation team-mate Dan Martin, as the former Tour de France champion looks to continue riding himself back into form and the Irishman prepares for the Giro.

The other riders using the race as homework ahead of the Giro include 2020 runner-up Jai Hindley, accompanied by new team-mate Romain Bardet, who will be making his debut at the Italian Grand Tour.

Simon Yates (BikeExchange) and Aleksandr Vlasov (Astana - Premier Tech) are two more names on the start line who will be amongst the favourites for the first Grand Tour of the season, while Ilnur Zakarin continues his first season back at Gazprom-RusVelo, and Pello Bilbao turns out for Bahrain-Victorious, who will be looking to add to their solitary win of the season so far.