The red jersey strikes at Aitana
Enric Mas won the ninth stage of the Vuelta on Sunday, topping out at Alto de Aitana. The Movistar rider had already started the day in the red jersey from Villajoyosa. He still wears it tonight, with a bigger gap to the chasers.
The stage covered 187.4 kilometres, packed with more than 5,000 metres of climbing and six categorised ascents. A break of 24 riders swallowed up most of the day in the heat of the Alicante backcountry before being reeled in on the final climb.
Mas kicked clear three kilometres from home. Oscar Onley latched onto his wheel. Felix Gall cracked. Primoz Roglic tried to haul himself back up to the pair and paid for it soon after. Mas then edged the Briton by 200 metres, using the inside line.
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A race blown open again since Saturday
The context gives the day its real weight. Tadej Pogacar quit on Saturday after a crash in stage eight, won in a sprint by Frenchman Bryan Coquard. The pre-race favourite for the Vuelta was out before the first rest day, leaving a race with no obvious boss.
Before this ninth stage, Mas led Gall by 1’11”, Roglic by 1’33”, Sepp Kuss by 2’15” and Onley by 2’16”. Richard Carapaz was next at 2’22”. In other words, the order was hanging by a thread and Aitana was the first real checkpoint since the start in Monaco.
Wout van Aert stays in green in the points standings, Andreas Leknessund keeps the polka-dot jersey and Onley remains the best young rider. The Dutchman and the Norwegian had built a lead in a first week battered by crashes and the cancellation of stage three.
A summit steeped in history
Alto de Aitana hosted its fifth Vuelta finish, 10 years after its last visit and 25 years after first appearing in the race. In 2016, on the eve of the Madrid finish, the air base saw Nairo Quintana beat Chris Froome in a showdown for the general classification. The setting fits, and so does the climb.
Twice runner-up in the Vuelta earlier in the decade, Mas has never won a Grand Tour. This is the clearest chance he has had in his career, on home roads, in front of a Spanish crowd that has been waiting a long time. The first rest day comes on Monday. The second week will tell whether this lead, built on Sunday, can survive the Asturian mountains.
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