Vuelta a España: Tadej Pogačar twists the knife with 50km solo raid in Andorra to win stage 4

With 50km to go on the first high mountain day of the Vuelta a España, Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) drained any potential tension out of the red jersey race as he stormed away and completely destroyed his opposition solo for victory on stage 4, taking a massive step in pursuit of completing his set of Grand Tour overall titles.

Returning to Andorra, where he announced himself to the world with a maiden Grand Tour stage win at the 2019 Vuelta, Pogačar displayed seven years of development into becoming the sport's top rider by all but putting the race to bed with 17 stages still to race – even more ridiculous after considering how one of the four stages was cancelled.

He made his winning move off the back of a hard tempo being set by Decathlon CMA CGM on the Collada de Beixalis for Felix Gall, who, having poked the bear, tried valiantly but quickly failed to follow the Slovenian when he left everyone else in the rearview mirror halfway into the stage.

Extending his lead over the next two and a half climbs, Pogačar won the day by a margin of 2:39 on what was his longest Grand Tour solo victory, also growing the overall lead he already had control of out to 3:31, with four-time winner Primož Roglič the closest on GC.

Having had to settle for a fight for the podium, Pogačar's rivals could not be separated for the most part after some tough and tactical racing over the final two climbs.

In the end, 20-year-old Jarno Widar (Lotto-Intermarché) provided a look into the next generation by winning the small group sprint for second, with Gall only managing third after all of his and his team's efforts.

Already with a massive lead in red, also in control of the green points and jersey, and now leading the King of the Mountains classification, Pogačar has a chokehold on nearly everything available in this Vuelta, and anything but more stage wins en route to the title in Granada looks unlikely.

Asked after the stage if he had to go so early, Pogačar admitted, "No, no, I didn't have to do that. But the pace was super high already on the first climb, and then on the second climb we were going basically all-out from the bottom.

"When Jay [Vine] let me pass on the wheel of Decathlon, I knew I didn't want to be isolated against all the GC riders because they will all play against me. I tried with an attack on the climb and just hoped that I could survive until the finish when I saw that I could open the gap, and I did it. It was pretty tough, but beautiful out there."

More than happy with the large gap he eked out over his rivals, Pogačar is committing to defending the jersey and trying to become the first rider since Gianni Bugno in the 90s to lead a Grand Tour from start to finish.

"I mean, any gap is more than enough. But yeah, it's super good because now I can be calm and confident for the next days. We just keep going day by day and focus on each day after this, because it will be a little bit less stressful for sure," said Pogačar.

"I mean, I will say you never know, but now it's a good gap. So we give our best to control it every day. But if it's uncontrollable, you cannot control, and then we will have to fight. But it's going to be tough. We have a really strong team here, so we are ready."

How it unfolded

After the drama of Monday's hailstorm and cancellation, normal service resumed at the Vuelta a España in Andorra la Vella, where a short but brutal 104km stage would bring the riders through the first high mountain stage of the 2026 edition, and there was one clear favourite.

Returning to where he made his name as a Grand Tour rider seven years ago at the Vuelta, race leader Tadej Pogačar and UAE Team Emirates-XRG made their intentions clear right from kilometre zero, with the black and white jerseys immediately coming to the front to pace for their all-conquering leader. Just one day after the weather denied him a chance at racing for victory, everyone was expecting a full-on Pogačar show.

With several riders on adopted home roads in the landlocked Pyrenean microstate, there were still many willing attackers, with Visma-Lease a Bike the most interested team in forming an early breakaway.

With Wout van Aert, Matthew Brennan, Bruno Armirail and Ben Tulett all getting up the road, alongside Finn Fisher-Black (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Pablo Castrillo, Raul Garcia Pierna (Movistar), Eddie Dunbar (Pinarello Q36.5), Alexey Lutsenko (NSN), Simon Dalby (Uno X Mobility), Paul Double (Jayco AlUla), Georg Steinhauser (EF Education-EasyPost), Lorenzo Fortunato (XDS Astana), Ivan Sosa (Kern Pharma), Gijs Leemreize, and Mattia Gaffuri (Picnic PostNL), the gap started to go out to more than minute.

UAE led the peloton out of neutral for the opening 20km onto the Port d'Envalira (23.3km at 5.1%), but with 85km to go, they were overtaken by Decathlon CMA CGM, who started to set an infernal pace for Felix Gall's GC ambitions.

The break still managed to lead over the summit, Lorenzo Fortunato (XDS Astana) taking the maximum King of the Mountains points and moving into the virtual lead of that blue and white jersey – what unfolded later in the stage would deny him at the finish, though.

Decathlon's efforts reduced the break's advantage down to under 30 seconds at the top, and on the descent, made contact with the 16 leaders with 70km to go. Decimating much of the peloton, the next climb would offer more room for inflicting damage, the Collada de Beixalis (7km at 8.5%).

Decathlon set the tempo

At the foot of the second category 1 climb along the route, UAE moved back into control with Pogačar ominously setting Jay Vine to work on the front. This didn't last long, though, as Decathlon showed their confidence and re-took the responsibility of pacing.

Gall had his trusty Austrian compatriot Gregor Mühlberger working for him on the front, setting an infernal tempo which completely blew up the group of favourites, reducing the lead group to less than 15 riders with a touch more than 50km still to ride.

Pogačar quickly had enough. With 50.3km to go on stage 4, he took it to all of his rivals on the Collada de Beixalis. While almost everyone disappeared behind him into obscurity, Gall tried – as he did at the Giro behind Jonas Vingegaard – to follow the race leader, but soon couldn't hold the pace.

Just 2km later, Pogačar was 48 seconds up the road, and Gall was back in what remained of the peloton. EF Education-EasyPost took up the mantle of pacing through recent development team graduate Juan Felipe Rodriguez, who paced for Richard Carapaz, but the gap only continued to grow in the wrong direction, out to more than 1:30 at the summit.

The final category 1 climb of the stage was the common training ascent for much of the peloton, the Coll d'Ordino (10km at 7%), and with Pogačar two minutes out of sight at the foot, cooperation started to fail in the group behind, prompting Decathlon to come back to the front.

Onto the Ordino and Gall would attack again, dropping everyone except for Oscar Onley (Nectompany Ineos) as the fight for the podium hotted up on stage 4. Four-time winner Primož Roglič wasn't done, though, accelerating to try and bridge across with around 5km of the climb still to come.

Looking like the Roglič of old, he scorched across the gap in no time, before Enric Mas (Movistar) and Sepp Kuss (Visma-Lease a Bike) did the same, making a five-man leading chase group, who failed again to cooperate.

The final climb

On the downhill approach to the final climb, Alto de la Comella (4km at 5.9%), the group of five became nine, as they were joined by Jarno Widar (Lotto-Intermarché), Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek), Carapaz, and Mühlberger, setting up a tactical fight in the last 10km.

Decathlon, for the umpteenth time, moved to the front with Mühlberger leading out Gall on the short ascent, which did for Skjelmose's hopes as he dropped. 2:48 down the road on Pogačar, Gall was attacking again but without much result, prompting Roglič to counter and drop Carapaz.

With four bonus seconds available for second to the top of the climb, Onley sprinted ahead to take them in front of Gall, who took the last two seconds available. All of this aggression reduced the gap to Pogačar to 2:43, who was approaching victory further up the road.

Even with the likes of Skjelmose and Carapaz off the back, the chasing group of GC challengers could not be separated, with a sprint set to decide the minor placings on stage 4. Some 2:39 after Pogačar, Widar would win the charge for second just ahead of Gall, with only Onley, Mas, Kuss and Roglič making it into the first chase group.

Results

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