Ethan Vernon takes stage 5 sprint win at Volta a Catalunya

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Ethan Vernon of QuickStep-AlphaVinyl won stage 5 of the Volta a Catalunya to Vilanova i la Geltrú after João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates) and Nairo Quintana (Arkea-Samsic) clashed in the late intermediate sprint as they fought for every second and the overall race lead.

The 21-year-old British sprinter had the power and speed to sprint down the centre of the road to hold off his rivals. It was his first victory just three months into his professional career.

Phil Bauhaus (Bahrain Victorious) was second and Dorian Godon (AG2R Citroën) was third.

Almeida managed to finish third in the late intermediate sprint. He finished safely in the peloton and so took the leader’s white and green jersey from Quintana. The Colombian is now one second behind, with Sergio Higuita (Bora-Hansgrohe) third at seven seconds before Saturday’s hilly stage to Cambrils and then Sunday’s final stage on the tough Montjuic circuit in Barcelona.

“It’s brilliant to win. We weren’t too far off it on stage 2 and I knew what I had to do to correct it. I did that today and it worked perfectly,” Vernon said.

“It was a chaotic stage. It split at the bonus sprint before the last climb and we missed it, so we had to ride to bring it back. At that point I thought it was over because the front of the race was miles away but the lads did a great job to bring it back and put me in a great position in the final kilometres. I wouldn’t have won without my teammates.”

How it unfolded

With the overall classification on a knife-edge, the longest stage in this year’s Volta a Catalunya began predictably enough with a flurry of attempts to get in the breakaway of the day in the hope the overall contenders would let them go.

Urko Berrade (Kern Pharma), Joel Nicolau (Caja Rural Seguros RGA) and Gotzon Martin (Euskaltel-Euskadi) eventually managed to use the lower slopes of the one classified climb of the day, the third category Coll de Comiols, to go clear.

Well before the summit of the very long but not excessively hard Comiols, the trio had rapidly built up a lead of over three minutes. Curiously, rather than Arkea-Samsic controlling the race for Nairo Quintana, instead it was Bahrain-Victorious and Bike Exchange-Jayco, the latter working for their sprinter Kaden Groves, doing the bulk of the work behind.

On a relentlessly undulating course through central Catalunya, which slowly lead downhill towards the Mediterranean coast and finished in the town of Vilanova i la Geltrú, the three-man move stretched their lead to a maximum of nearly five minutes.

Meanwhile behind there were a trickle of abandons, including UAE sprinter Juan Sebastian Molano and Movistar’s Albert Torres.

When QuickStep-AlphaVinyl, working for their British sprinter Ethan Vernon, added their collective shoulder to the win, the lead began to drop as quickly as it had risen.

However, it was a sudden acceleration roughly halfway through the stage courtesy of UAE Team Emirates which caused the three racers’ advantage to shrink radically, dropping to less than three minutes as UAE Team Emirates attempted to force an echelon in the bunch.

After a few kilometres, though, with Quintana and his team clearly aware of what UAE Team Emirates were trying to hatch, Almeida’s team ceased trying to ambush the Colombian and their other GC rivals.

For the next hour an uneasy truce ensued, with the three managing to stretch open their lead again a little more. However, even before the first of two intermediate sprints at la Bisbal de Penedes, a fraction under 30 kilometres from the finish, Team BikeExchange and Quick Step began to up the pace again with the aim of reeling in the break for good.

Nicolau won the first intermediate sprint ahead of Berrade and Martin with 30km to go but were swept up 10km later.

The overall contenders, and especially Almeida and Quintana, wanted to fight for the time bonuses and several lead-out trains formed with Almeida and Quintana trying to hold their teammates’ wheels.

UAE Team Emirates appeared in charge but Uno-X and then Arkea-Samsic came up late. The riders were spread across the road as the line appeared.

Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X) won the sprint to collect three seconds, with Rui Costa (UAE Team Emirates) taking two seconds and Almeida was third to collect a single but ultimately vital one-second time bonus.

The sprinters and their teammates took control after that, closing down several late attacks and ensuring a fast, hectic finish and a first win for Vernon.