Jumbo-Visma again dominated on a mountain stage with an entertaining performance from Primož Roglič who attacked his teammate and race leader Sepp Kuss, with Jonas Vingegaard following the Slovenian, despite all three at that point leading the race without any other rival teams.
Altu de L’Angliru (12.20 km, 10.49%) is one of the steepest climbs in pro cycling with gradients going way over 10% in the second half of the climb. Jumbo-Visma began the day leading the Vuelta overall classification with three riders, Sepp Kuss, Jonas Vingegaard and Primož Roglič. All of them are the strongest climbers in the race which is a unique situation in the modern era of Grand Tours.
As expected it was going to be a GC day as the breakaway did not get enough gap from Jumbo’s rouleurs to stand a chance against the mighty Bahrain-Victorious train with Tiberi, Caruso, Buitrago, Poels and Landa who was fighting for the 4th spot in the GC against Ayuso and Soler. Remco Evenepoel was the last survivor of the breakaway but a minute gap before Angliru was not enough. The high pace in the GC group was one of the reasons why the gap was small as Marc Soler launched early with 52 km to go, ignoring his 6th place in the overall classification and later losing many minutes on the steep climb.
It was not a high fatigue day as Steff Cras spent 2,545 kilojoules for 2:36h before the climb, at a reasonable intensity of 14.67 kj/kg/h. A low kilojoule day from Jumbo-Visma riders tends to benefit Roglič compared to Kuss and Vingegaard, who both excel on extremely difficult days.
Bahrain-Victorious had an insanely strong team, setting a high and steady pace on Angliru. Wout Poels in the 2017 La Vuelta finished together with his then teammate Chris Froome on the hard climb, setting the fastest time that day, and finished second behind Juan Jose Cobo in 2011. Poels again was lethal on the steep ramps with Landa and the Jumbo-Visma big three were the only survivors.
After Poels finished his job and Landa started to set a lower pace, Kuss, Roglič and Vingegaard were the only ones in the front. Despite Sepp Kuss having helped Roglič in many Grand Tours and being the race leader, the Slovenian gifted the American on his 29th birthday more pain and accelerated in the final kilometres. Vingegaard was not helping Roglič and was sitting on his wheel, while Kuss was fighting for the red jersey against his teammates.
Roglič won his 12th Vuelta stage and finished with Vingegaard who probably could have gone faster, while Kuss with a little help from Landa lost 19 seconds on the stage not counting bonus seconds and kept his leader’s jersey but Vingegaard (+0:08) and Roglič (+1:08) cut the gap. Ayuso lost +1:42 on Angliru to Roglič and is almost three minutes behind the Slovenian in the GC as the best non-Jumbo-Visma rider.
Results powered by FirstCycling.com
The legendary Robert Heras record of 41 minutes was not broken but it was close. Roglič and Vingegaard climbed Angliru in 41:24 min, pushing 6.43 ᵉW/Kg. Many riders broke their 40+ minute power records in this race as the climb was steep, well paced by Bahrain-Victorious early, relatively low kilojoules before the base and at low altitude. Vingegaard if he went full gas and attacked Roglič probably could have broken Heras’ record. The level of climbing is extremely high as Roglič, Vingegaard, Landa, Kuss and Poels beat Chris Horner’s incredible time (42:15 min) set in the 2013 La Vuelta which until this day was the second fastest ascent on Angliru. Roglič and Vingegaard were 29 seconds faster than Heras on the steep section of the climb, which means that most of the time was lost against the legendary Spaniard during the first six kilometres which were not that steep and had the pace set by Bahrain. Roglič and Vingegaard on the steep part did 6.75 ᵉW/Kg for 26:28 min.
Kuss is the shape of his life and has performed exceptionally on mountain stages in this Vuelta, protecting his leader's jersey from his teammates Roglič and Vingegaard. There are two more mountain days left on stages 18 and 20. Tomorrow it will be a hard mountain top finish on La Cruz de Linares (8.3 km, 8.5%), where Roglič likely might try again to attack with Vingegaard following his wheel and Kuss trying his best not to lose the lead.