Jonas Vingegaard Pushes All-Time Great Watts

Jonas Vingegaard dominated the Itzulia Basque Country stage race, winning the overall title and three stages. On the final day the Tour de France champion launched on the penultimate Arrate climb and did his career-best pure ᵉw/kg performance.

The final day of Basque Country is always exciting as the parcours contains multiple steep 10-15 minute climbs, offering opportunities for attackers and various tactics. At the start of the stage, a strong breakaway with a dozen GC riders and climbers got a decent gap. The group included two Jumbo-Visma climbers, Attila Valter and Steven Kruijswijk who possibly could be used as satellite riders if the race leader Jonas Vingegaard attacked or conversely needed help in the second half of the stage after the steepest climb, the Krabelin in the middle of the stage.

Hirschi, Dunbar, Guerreiro, Paret-Peintre, Felipe Martinez, Buchmann, Vanhoucke, Chaves, Armirail and Taaramäe were other riders that made the split. Buchmann was the closest in GC being only 97 seconds behind the race leader Vingegaard but as Jumbo-Visma had two riders and Vallter was only 6 seconds behind Buchmann in the GC, the Dutch team did not need to chase. Bahrain-Victorious had no riders in the leading group and it was Hermann Pernsteiner’s duty to pull the peloton for a long time. There were attempts in the peloton from Mauro Schmid and other riders to bridge the gap to the breakaway but it was clear that Jumbo-Visma had a plan and they were going to launch Vingegaard on the steep Izua climb (4.1 km, 9.0%) with around 30 kilometres to go.

First, it was Sam Oomen who did a strong pull at the base of Itzua. After that Cofidis climber Ion Izagirre upped the tempo on his home climb which was perfect for Vingegaard who a few moments later accelerated and only Enric Mas stayed in his wheel. The Hungarian champion Valter was waiting for his teammate and did a one-minute pull.

After Valter it was Kruijswijk’s time to smash as the Jumbo-Visma masterclass continued. The Flying Dutchman had saved some energy and did a 90-second pull showing great legs like on Plateau de Solaison in the 2023 Dauphiné. Mas was still in the wheel, while Landa was chasing in the background.

They caught Ruben Guerreiro, the teammate of Mas, but it was Vingegaard’s time to attack. He distanced Mas immediately as the Spaniard was riding over his limit trying to follow the Jumbo-Visma mountain train, with the Spaniard losing 43 seconds in two kilometres and being caught by the chasing group with Landa and the other GC riders.

Vingegaard was giving his all and quickly caught Chaves as the last breakaway survivor with Schmid on his wheel. Vingegaard did the climb in 11 minutes and 17 seconds. Felix Gall who was in the GC group before Izua spent 2718 kilojoules for 2 hours and 57 minutes, which is 14.27 kj/kg/h. It is almost 3000 kilojoules for 3 hours and the tempo on climbs was not easy. The GC group did Krabelin in 16:25 min, with Vingegaard pushed 6:17 ᵉw/kg in the draft behind Pernsteiner who was pulling.

Vingegaard up the Izua did an estimated 7.46 ᵉw/kg for 11 minutes and 17 seconds and became the first rider since Alberto Contador (2009 Verbier) to reach the pink All-Time Top 25 trend-line. Vingegaard already did an impressive performance on La Astuariana climb on Stage 4, which was over the red generational trend-line. This was possible thanks to almost perfect conditions – a low-altitude climb with steep gradients and a hard and steady pace from the bottom.