Vuelta Femenina: Anna van der Breggen routs rivals on steep slopes of Les Praeres for stage 6 victory and moves into GC lead

Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime) won stage 6 of the Vuelta Femenina, dominating the finishing climb to Les Praeres, and took the overall lead. She arrived at the summit finish ahead of Paula Blasi (UAE Team ADQ) and Marion Bunel (Visma-Lease a Bike), who rounded out the podium.

Cédrine Kerbaol (EF Education-Oatly) had attacked into the 3.7km finishing climb, but her small gap was quickly closed, and Van der Breggen immediately started setting the pace. On the crazily-steep slopes of up to 27% gradient, she rode rider after rider off her wheel.

With 2.5km remaining to the finish, Blasi, the last rider who could stay with her, had to let go, and Van der Breggen continued alone. Blasi kept the gap small but was unable to come back to Van der Breggen and finished eight seconds behind in second place. Bunel in third place was 29 seconds down.

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Van der Breggen moved from fourth overall to the GC lead with the victory.

"It was a really hard day. A climb like this, I think I’ve never seen that before," said Van der Breggen.

"The girls took care of me all day. I actually wasn’t feeling so good in the beginning of the race because I could still feel the crash from yesterday, but it was getting better and better. So in the end, I had the confidence that I should be able to ride normally. Finishing like this, I’m incredibly happy.

"The climb was special. It started steep and it finished steep. I just tried to get a good pace. You need to pace it well, but it’s also not that long today, tomorrow is way longer. I tried to do well, and luckily, it was enough in the end,” the new Vuelta leader looked back on the climb to Les Praeres.

More to come ...

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