Vuelta a España: Ganna storms to clear win in time trial as Evenepoel gains

Filippo Ganna won stage 10 of the Vuelta a España on Tuesday, a 25.8km individual time trial in Valladolid, finishing 16sec ahead of Remco Evenepoel.

Ganna, riding for Ineos Grenadiers, put down an early marker but even the Italian knew it would all come down to the final riders out on the course, those at the top of the general classification. “At the moment I’m happy, obviously. We’ll wait for the end when the big riders come,” Ganna said at the end of his ride.

Evenepoel’s second place moved the defending champion into third overall and he gained more than one minute on the leader, Sepp Kuss. Kuss went into the stage with a 43sec lead over Marc Soler, with Evenepoel in fourth more than two minutes adrift.

The time trial was always going to see Evenepoel, wearing the rainbow jersey after winning the world road time trial in August, make a claim for the leader’s red jersey. More important than beating Ganna was taking as much time as possible from Kuss. The American put in a great effort to finish 13th in the stage and hold on to red.

“Let’s say that we have to be happy with the GC gaps I took today, and also coming quite closer to Sepp [Kuss] who did, actually, a super good time trial,” Evenepoel said after the race.

Ganna, runner-up to Evenepoel in the world road time trial, and one of the favourite’s for the stage, posted an impressive time of 27min 39sec. Nobody came close to Ganna’s time until Primoz Roglic hit the road. The Jumbo-Visma rider moved into second in the stage, 36 seconds down on the Italian, and ended the stage in third after Evenepoel overtook his time.

Ganna lost out on stage five in a sprint finish to Kaden Groves but with the time trial he has finally achieved one of his ambitions. “I’m really happy, to win also here was my dream, my goal, so today I can say I did that,” the 27-year-old said once his stage win was confirmed.

Roglic moves up into fourth having started the day in sixth. Evenepoel is now 1min 9sec behind Kuss, with Soler 26sec off the leader. Wednesday’s stage 11 is a mostly flat 163.5km ride with an uphill finish, from Lerma to La Laguna Negra.