Vuelta a Burgos: Felix Gall solos to victory on stage 3

After a great climbing battle on stage 3 of the Vuelta a Burgos, Felix Gall (Decathlon CMA CGM) emerged victorious, dropping everyone on the brutal, foggy slopes of the Puerto del Escudo to win solo by an 11-second margin.

Lidl-Trek kicked off the action on the 7km ascent which averaged 9% gradients, with Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek) first attacking 4.5km from the summit. He was countered by 20-year-old Pablo Torres (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) before Gall's Decathlon team started leading him out.

When the Giro d'Italia runner-up made his attack, he was followed only by the other strongest climbers in the race: Ciccone, race leader Oscar Onley (Netcompany Ineos) and Enric Mas (Movistar).

Onley tried to take his second victory in as many days by attacking 2.3km from the top, dropping Ciccone and Mas in the process, but – while visibly gasping for air – he was unable to get rid of Gall, who was glued to his wheel and soon countered again.

Gall broke Onley's resolve with another vicious seated acceleration as they neared the summit, coming over the top with enough of a lead to hold on during the descent to the line, able to celebrate only his third professional victory.

Faltering towards the line, Onley was also re-overtaken by Ciccone and a charging Giulio Pellizzari (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), meaning he lost out on bonus seconds and was overtaken in the race lead by Gall.

"It's the first time I'm doing the Vuelta a Burgos, and I was really looking forward to this race; I've heard many good things," said Gall after the finish. "Today was the first good stage for me, and it's not so often that I win – it was only my third pro win – so it's super nice. I had a really big block of training and to come back to racing, I felt super super good today.

"My team did a great job of keeping me safe, allowing me to save energy and then in the final I always had someone around me, tried attacking a few times and then I managed to get away in the last part.

Gall now leads the race by six seconds from Ciccone, with Onley dropping down to third, eight seconds back. It's all still to play for with the iconic Lagunas de Neila climb (6.4km at 9.1%) still to come on Saturday's stage 5, where the purple jersey winner will be decided.

"Of course [winning GC] is the goal, but first of all, I'm happy with today, and you never know what's happening in a bike race," added Gall. "First tomorrow should be a sprint and then Saturday we have another really hard stage. Day by day, and then we'll see what it's going to be in the end."

In similar fashion to the opening two stages, five riders went up the road to form the early breakaway, but only after 50km of racing and the second categorised climb of the day, the Alto de la Hoya: Bastien Tronchon (Groupama-FDJ United), Gorka Corres (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies), Diego Uriarte (Equipo Kern Pharma), and Iker Mintegi (Euskaltel-Euskadi).

They were kept close by the UAE-led peloton, with a gap under two minutes, but led the race over the next two climbs. Onto the fourth of seven climbs on the tough 184km route, three riders bridged across to join the leader: Pavel Sivakov (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), Milan Vader (Pinarello Q36.5), and Jasper Schoofs (Soudal-QuickStep Devo Team).

The break led over the top of the penultimate ascent with a 1:30 lead over the peloton and with just the final Puerto del Escudo climb (7 km at 9%) and descent to the finish to come, but this was quickly pulled back by the likes of Movistar, Lidl-Trek and Netcompany Ineos pacing behind, ending the break's day in front fully 10km from the line.

Results

General classification