Vuelta a Burgos: Landa snatches overall victory as Bardet struggles

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Mikel Landa (Bahrain Victorious) snatched overall victory from Romain Bardet (Team DSM) on the steep final climb of Lagunas de Neila to win the five-day Vuelta a Burgos stage race in northern Spain.

The Vuelta a Burgos is considered an important final race before the Vuelta a España, which begins on Saturday, August 14 and last year marked the return of racing after the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hugh Carthy (EF Education-Nippo) won the final stage with a late attack on the double-digit finish. Einer Rubio (Movistar) finished five seconds behind him, Simon Yates (Bike Exchange) was third and Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) was fourth at 13 seconds after making a late attack.

Landa finished sixth, 16 seconds behind Carthy, while Bardet lost more than a minute after being distanced in the final three kilometres. That allowed Landa to pull back a 45-second deficit and win overall.

Fabio Aru (Qhubeka NextHash) continued his return to form, finishing second overall at 36 seconds. Mark Padun (Bahrain Victorious) was third at 43 seconds, while Bardet slipped to sixth overall, at 54 seconds.

Landa suffered a broken left collarbone and multiple rib fractures in the crash during stage 5 of the Giro d’Italia but has spent the summer recovering and working on his form.

How it unfolded

Bardet started the final stage as the favourite to win overall after his impressive victory on stage 3. However, Landa hails from the Basque Country close to Burgos and was keen to show his form as the Vuelta a España nears.

Gonzalo Serrano (Movistar), Marcus Burghardt (Bora-Hansgrohe), Lawson Craddock (EF Education-Nippo), Sep Vanmarcke (Israel Start-Up Nation), Álvaro Cuadros (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) and Mikel Bizkarra (Euskaltel-Euskadi) formed the early break of the stage and fought to stay away despite the steep finish.

They were more than five minutes ahead at one point and survived until the final three kilometres, even attacking each other in the hope of winning the stage. However first Team DSM and then Bahrain Victorious lead the peloton, determined to set up Landa.

The six attackers were still 90 seconds ahead with eight kilometres to climb but Bahrain Victorious hunted them down. Padun was the first to attack from the GC group as the road steepened when the race came back together. That hurt Bardet and the double-digit gradients saw him distanced despite digging deep.

Australia’s Jay Vine (Alpecin-Fenix) jumped across to Padun just before the final kilometre as Landa paced his ride.

Rubio and Bernal managed to close the gap in the steep final kilometre and Bernal even made an attack with 500m to race. However, Rubio and Carthy followed him and then the tall British rider made his decisive attack with 300 metres to race. He opened a gap and had time to celebrate his first win of the 2021 season.

Landa finished sixth and counted the seconds until Bardet finished and the speaker announced him as the overall winner.

It was Landa’s first victory since the 2019 Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali stage race. He finished fourth in the 2020 Tour de France and fourth in the 2019 Giro d’Italia but has often failed to pull off a major win.