Vuelta a España GC continues to take shape

A Grand Tour debutant, Andrea Bagioli is 15th overall.

The season’s third and final Grand Tour took on some not so familiar roads Thursday afternoon, when it travelled from Lodosa to La Laguna Negra, where for the second time in three days an uphill finish (8.6km, 5.8%) was scheduled. Unlike the previous stages, the race was very quiet until the final kilometer, a steep one that whittled down the red jersey group to just a handful of riders. From there it came down to a late sprint that Dan Martin (Israel Start-Up Nation) won ahead of race leader Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma).

For the third consecutive day, neo-pro Andrea Bagioli was Deceuninck – Quick-Step’s best man. Helped by Mattia Cattaneo, who is racing here for the first time since crashing out the Giro dell’Emilia in August, the young Italian climber finished one minute behind the winner and kept his impressive second place on the white jersey classification.

La Vuelta continues Friday with the easiest stage of the opening week, a 191.7km journey from Garray to Ejea de los Caballeros.

Photo credit: ©David Ramos / Getty Images