Eddie Dunbar (Team Jayco AlUla) said after losing more time at La Vuelta on Sunday he would regroup with a view to getting in breakaways on the race and he began that approach on stage 10 to Baiona today.
Ultimately, it was Wout van Aert (Visma Lease a Bike) who won the stage, and the Belgian made it look easy; taking his third victory of the race. And having finished in the top three on six of the 10 stages so far, he seems certain to take more wins, with the points classification a foregone conclusion.
Today, Ireland's Dunbar lit it up on the Alto de Fonfría - the cat 2 climb that began just after the start of the stage. He got a gap with 18km completed before a very strong breakaway group formed around him, including some big names.
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In that move were: Dani Martinez (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe), Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates), Mauri Vansevenant (Soudal-Quick-Step), Quinten Hermans (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Sylvain Moniquet (Lotto Dstny), Einer Rubio (Movistar), Cristian Rodriguez (Arkéa-B&B Hotels), Urko Berrade (Kern Pharma) and Mikel Bizkarra (Euskaltel-Euskadi).
Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) and Pavel Sivakov (UAE Team Emirates) also made a move to get across to the leaders, as riders were being spat out the back as a result of the uphill start, straight out of the rest day.
⛰️ A tricky stage post-rest day
⚡️ A spectacular start to form the winning break
? Wout takes his 3rd victory!
❤️ O'Connor keeps La Roja for another day.?️ Enjoy the stage ? highlights of #LaVuelta24 pic.twitter.com/gRvbx3aiA8
— La Vuelta (@lavuelta) August 27, 2024
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However, it came back together and in the next volley of attacks, still on the opening climb of the day, the winning move got clear. It initially contained Marc Soler (UAE Team Emirates), Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) and William Junior Lecerf (Soudal-QuickStep).
Juri Hollmann (Alpecin-Deceuninck) and Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ) then attacked from the peloton in a bid to catch the leaders. Their efforts soon paid off, as the breakaway swelled to five, with 44km completed in the first hour of racing.
However, the leaders still only had about 20 seconds on the bunch after 50km. After several more counter attacks, the leaders eventually drew clear, building an advantage of just over six minutes. And when their gap was just over four minutes with 40km remaining, it was clear they would stay away.
With about 30km to go to the finish, Van Aert attacked just before the intermediate sprint and was joined by Pacher; that duo going to the line for a two-up sprint easily won by Van Aert.
Soler claimed the sprint for 3rd place, some 2:01 down on Van Aert and Pacher, with Lecerf 4th and Hollmann 5th. The peloton, which numbered just over 50 riders, was 5:31 down and is it contained all the general classification men there was no change in the overall.
Dunbar finished in the reduced peloton, in 26th place, with Darren Rafferty (EF Education-EasyPost) in 74th at 14:44.
Ben O'Connor (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) still leads overall by 3:53 from Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe), with Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) 3rd at 4:32
