Primoz Roglic has stamped his authority on La Vuelta 2021; dropping Egan Bernal in a two-man head-to-head on the final climb to take the stage win today and regain the race lead.
Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) attacked the large select group with just over 60km to go on today’s stage 17. He made his move early on the second passage of the 7.6km of La Collada Llomena on the 185.5km stage from Unquera to Lagos de Covadonga.
Only Roglic (Jumbo Visma) responded and they rode away from the select group, led in their wake by Bahrain Victorious working for Jack Haig. Miguel Angel Lopez (Movistar) eventually attacked after Roglic and Bernal but after failing to close in on the two leaders, he soon went back to the chasing group.
While Bernal did the work on the front for a long time at the head of the race, Roglic eventually began to help him. And when they moved onto the final climb of the day up to the finish line – the 12.5km HC Lagos de Covadonga - they had almost 1½ minutes on the chasing group.
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Roglic pressed on the pedals with just
over 7km to go and immediately a gap appeared between him and Bernal. It grew
very quickly and within about 1.5km Roglic led Bernal by over 50 seconds, with
the Colombian powerless to do anything but lose time.
As Roglic powered on and Bernal tried to limit his losses to the Slovenian, Enric Mas (Movistar) attacked the chasing group behind them. However, Adam Yates (Ineos Grenadiers), Sepp Kuss (Jumbo Visma) and Lopez caught him with about 4km to go.
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🇪🇸 Vive el último kilómetro de la victoria de @rogla en los Lagos de Covadonga gracias a @CarrefourES
🇬🇧 Live the last km. of Primož Roglič's victory in Lagos de Covadonga thanks to @CarrefourES#CarrefourConLaVuelta pic.twitter.com/SUcngvzWKL— La Vuelta (@lavuelta) September 1, 2021
Behind that small group, Wout Poels
continued to pace Jack Haig up the climb and the Bahrain Victorious duo managed
to get back on terms and they all soon caught Bernal with 2km to go.
However, there was no stopping Roglic up ahead and he won the stage solo, in sodden conditions, by 1:35 from the chasing group, led home by Kuss.
While Bernal put it all on the line today - attacking with 61km to go - to try and gain the time back on GC that he needed to win the race overall, he came up well short.
And in the final 7km Bernal's effort fell apart; Roglic putting 1:35 into him during that phase of the race. That gap would have been more but for the chasing group catching Bernal.
The result means both Bernal and Yates lost 1:35 to Roglic today. They are the best-placed riders overall for Ineos Grenadiers, in 6th and 7th overall; a disappointing return after Bernal's huge effort today.
Roglic now leads the race by 2:22 from Mas, with Lopez 3rd at 3:11, Haig 4th at 3:46, Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) down three places to 5th at 4:16, Bernal 6th at 4:29 and Yates 7th at 4:45.
Race leader this morning, Odd Christian Eiking (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert Matériaux), suffered a crash today just inside the 50km marker but was able to remount and continue. He was 23rd today at 9:23 and after a brilliant week leading the race he is now down to 11th overall.
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