He’s back. After his deeply-disappointing Tour de France, Enric Mas (Movistar) returned to Grand Tour GC action with a vengeance as he shadowed new race leader Remco Evenepoel (QuickStep-AlphaVinyl) to the top of the 2022 Vuelta a España’s first summit finish.
Mas was the only rider able to follow Evenepoel when the Belgian star attacked some seven kilometres from the finish atop the Pico Jano, as arch-favorite Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) struggled and the rest of the contenders fell behind.
Mas did not attempt to collaborate with Evenepoel and the Belgian could only shake him off very close to the mist-enshrouded summit by one second, Mas finishing behind him for third on the stage.
But the most important damage was inflicted behind, as combined with time bonuses for second and third place, the two managed to put nearly 90 seconds into the rest of the GC field.
For Evenepoel taking the first Grand Tour leader’s jersey of his career is a hugely important milestone. But for Mas, now third overall, racing so strongly on home soil represents a major bounceback after he experienced a psychological ‘block’ in the Tour de France with descending and was forced to abandon with COVID-19.
“Today’s result is really positive,” Mas told reporters at the summit of the Pico Jano, “but actually things have been doing well since I started this race in Holland, where I was happy to get through without crashing.
“I actually didn’t know that I’m third overall now, just that we were gaining time on a lot of very important riders like Primož.”
Although Pico Jano has never been tackled in a pro race before, Mas said that he had benefited from knowing the finishing climb for his time as an amateur, as it is often used in the Vuelta a Besaya Junior stage race.
“It was a very hard stage, both because of the roads and the weather. You could see from even before the last two big climbs, when the bunch split apart on a little bit of uphill, that it was a very tense, fast day. But it was great to come back here too," he added.
Mas explained that although he had not been able to work with Evenepoel to try and broaden the gap yet further, it had not been for lack of wanting on his part.
“I had my work cut out just to stay on his wheel,” Mas added with a laugh. “We all know he goes all out at some point and try an attack, seeing how his team went for it so hard beforehand. So it was 'easy', to guess that he would go for it. It wasn’t so easy to follow.”
Up to a certain point, it’s possible to see parallels between Mas' performance on Thursday and how he raced in the first big mountain stage of the 2021 Vuelta at Velefique. That day, Mas was the only rider capable of following Roglič up the road and the two gained nearly a minute on the rest of the field, laying a hefty downpayment on his final second place overall in the process.
But on this occasion, it was Mas and Evenepoel who gained time on Roglič, placing the Spaniard in a pole position to at least try for a third podium in the Vuelta, and maybe more. Perhaps what matters more is that regardless of what happens in the two Asturian summit finishes this weekend, let alone the rest of the Vuelta, Mas has confirmed on Pico Jano that he is back in the GC game with a bang.
