Primoz Roglic won a gruelling mountain stage 17 of Vuelta a España ahead of his teammate Jonas Vingegaard, as their Jumbo-Visma colleague, Sepp Kuss, retained the overall leader’s jersey by eight seconds.
The 124.5km course started at Ribadesella and featured two category-one ascents before finishing through the clouds on Altu de l’Angliru, with Jumbo-Visma again showing strength to last the distance.
The Soudal-QuickStep duo of Remco Evenepoel and Mattia Cattaneo were among those who made early attacks along with Marc Soler of UAE Team Emirates. Evenepoel reached the top of Alto del Cordal as he looked to cement his place in the blue-dotted climber’s jersey, but both he and Soler were eventually reeled in by the peloton on the assent up l’Angliru.
Roglic attacked heading into the final three kilometres, but Vingegaard and Kuss stayed with him as the clouds rolled in. Kuss, celebrating his 29th birthday, could not keep up as the Tour de France champion Vingegaard and Roglic crafted a lead before the Slovenian went on to take the stage win.
A late sprint from Kuss saw the American finish 19 seconds behind in third, ahead of Bahrain Victorious duo Mikel Landa and Wout Poels, which proved enough to retain the overall leader’s red jersey.
“It’s a position I never expected to be in and that’s the beautiful thing about it,” Kuss said, after hanging on to the overall lead. “I came in without any expectations. I was just looking to help the guys like always, but then I came into this beautiful jersey and all the experiences that come with it.”
Kuss now holds an eight-second advantage over Vingegaard, with Roglic a further one minute back as Jumbo-Visma continue to dominate the general classification standings. The highest-ranked rider from outside the team is Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates), in fourth place and four minutes behind Kuss.
Stage 18 on Thursday will be another mountain course over 179km from Pola de Allande to La Cruz de Linares. Despite the prospect of a Tour-Vuelta double, Vingegaard insisted after the race he would be happy to see Kuss win the race.
“The win today was our main goal and to keep the situation – one, two, three on GC – so I think everything went the way we wanted,” the Dane said. “I think we can be happy with everything and, to be honest, I’m happy that Sepp is still in the jersey. I would love to see Sepp win this Vuelta.”
Roglic, who won this year’s Giro d’Italia and is one minute and eight seconds off the lead in third, took a different view. “I’m the first one to say that Sepp is there with all our victories, he’s there. I wish he wins … but I’m here to race. I’m here to do my best, and at the end, the best one will win.”
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