Jonas Vingegaard tames Tourmalet on Vuelta stage 13 as Evenepoel falls away

Jonas Vingegaard led a Jumbo-Visma 1-2-3 on the Tourmalet to win stage 13 of the Vuelta a España, on a dramatic day which saw Remco Evenepoel’s challenge fall apart completely in the Pyrenees.

Friday’s stage began in Formigal and featured three other climbs before a brutal final ascent of the Col du Tourmalet, one of cycling’s most famous challenges. The relentless climbing and downhill racing took its toll on many, including last year’s winner Evenepoel, who was left behind by his rivals.

Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) first ran into trouble on the day’s second climb, the Col d’Aubisque, and only lost further ground from there. The Belgian crossed the line 27 minutes behind the leaders and drops to 19th in the overall standings, with his hopes of defending the title in tatters.

This was another day of dominance for the Jumbo-Visma team, who controlled the stage throughout. The overall leader, Sepp Kuss, was joined by Primoz Roglic and Vingegaard in the leading group on the final climb and the trio easily saw off an attempted counterattack by Movistar’s Enric Mas.

Vingegaard, who is seeking back-to-back Tour de France and Vuelta titles, made his telling break with 8km to the finish. A smiling Kuss held onto the leader’s jersey with a brave ride to finish runner-up ahead of Roglic as Jumbo-Visma swept the podium.

Jumbo-Visma also now occupy the top three spots in the general classification, with Kuss leading Roglic by 1min 37sec and Vingegaard in third, seven seconds behind Roglic. Juan Ayoso of UAE Team Emirates is in fourth, 2min 37sec behind Kuss.

After the race, Vingegaard dedicated victory to his daughter, Frida. “Today is the birthday of my daughter and I wanted to win for her so bad today,” he said.

“Our plan was to see if we could take some times on the opponents today, and then it happened. I’m just so happy [and] proud,” the Danish rider added. Asked about Jumbo-Visma’s 1-2-3 on the day, Vingegaard replied: “I think it was even better than the plan.”