Vuelta a España: Cort takes his third stage win in Monforte de Lemos

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Magnus Cort captured his and EF Education-Nippo's third victory of the Vuelta a España on stage 19, proving the fastest rider from the breakaway as the seven men left standing held off the charging peloton in Monforte de Lemos.

The Dane outpaced Rui Oliveira (UAE Team Emirates) and Quinn Simmons (Trek-Segafredo) in the final dash for the line after almost four and half hours of racing. The breakaway crossed the line 18 seconds ahead of the peloton after a furious chase on the run-in to the line.

The remains of the escape had held a lead of just 30 seconds for the final 25 kilometres of the 191.2-kilometre stage after what was left of an initial 24-man move had been splintered further by an attack from Oliveira and Simmons.

A fast-paced pursuit with BikeExchange and DSM at the head followed although the two teams couldn't make any headway into the breakaway's small lead on the flat run to the finish. The leaders worked together until deep into the final kilometre when Cort's teammate Lawson Craddock put in a huge final turn to lead out the sprint.

At 200 metres to go, Simmons was the first to blink, launching from his compatriot's wheel as Cort and Oliveira reacted quickly to follow. Cort jumped out into the wind 50 metres later, and, as the quickest sprinter from the group, there was no doubt about his eventual victory as he won by a bike length.

"It's amazing. It's a dream and I really hope I don't wake up," Cort said after the stage. "It was not before the last five or six kilometres when I started believing actually. They always kept us close, and it was a really hard day.

"We didn't always work perfect together at the front; we had a few attacks and reduced the size of the group and in the end, everybody had tired legs and it was hard to work together in this hilly terrain but somehow we managed to hang onto it. I have to thank my teammate Lawson Craddock for doing a very amazing job, I could not have done this victory without having him with me in the breakaway today."

Cort has demonstrated amazing versatility in the Vuelta, winning with a solo attack on stage 6 on the Alto de la Montaña de Cullera where he held off Primoz Roglic, a bunch sprint win on stage 12 in Cordoba and now a small group sprint in Monforte de Lemos.

"I think the first [win] was the most spectacular one. It was amazing to win on top of a small - I'll call it a mountain, I come from Denmark and we don't have hills that big, it was almost a small mountain for me. That was a really special victory. Now having three in the same race – that's unbelievable."

Alberto Dainese (Team DSM) led the peloton home, sprinting to eighth place at 18 seconds behind Cort, who celebrated his fifth win of 2021 and the seventh Grand Tour stage win of his career.

Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) retains the overall race lead with two stages left to run before the conclusion in Santiago de Compostela. He leads Enric Mas (Movistar) by 2:30 after a quiet day for all but one of the GC top 10. Louis Meinjes (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert) wasn't so lucky, though, the South African crashing out of the 10th place 43 kilometres from the finish.

The other jerseys stayed with the same riders they had started the stage with, as Fabio Jakobsen (Deceuninck-QuickStep) kept hold of the green points jersey, Michael Storer (Team DSM) retained the polka dots of the mountain classification leader, and Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) continued in white as the best young rider.

How it unfolded

With three days left in the 2021 Vuelta a España, stage 19 of the race would provide a likely final chance either for the sprinters or the breakaway as the riders tackled a 191.2-kilometre stage from Tapia to Monforte de Lemos in Galicia, north-west Spain.

The stage was a hilly one, with three categorised climbs – the third-category Alto de Sela d'Entorcisa, and the second-category Alto da Garganta and Alto de Barbeitos – coming in the opening 60 kilometres. Further uncategorised challenges lay throughout the rolling roads of the remaining 130 kilometres, though nothing to put off punchy sprinters.

The opening kilometres of the stage saw multiple riders jump off the front of the peloton to make what turned out to be the break of the day. Mikael Cherel (AG2R Citroën) and Mark Padun (Bahrain Victorious) were among those kicking off the move, which soon swelled to over 20 riders as more and more men made their move on the Sela d'Entorcisa and Garganta.

With the pace still high on those early climbs, the large group whittled themselves down as more riders attempted to make it across. By the top of the Garganta, after 35 kilometres of racing,

Cherel and Padun had been joined by 17 others, with Nico Denz (Team DSM), Antonio Jesus Soto (Euskaltel Euskadi), Damien Touzé (AG2R-Citroën Team), Jay Vine (Alpecin-Fenix), Pelayo Sanchez (Burgos-BH), Julen Amezqueta, Oier Lazkano (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), Andrea Bagioli (Deceuninck-Quick Step), Lawson Craddock, Magnus Cort (EF Education Nippo), Anthony Roux (Groupama-FDJ), Andreas Kron (Lotto Soudal), Robert Stannard (Team BikeEchange), Fabio Aru (Qhubeka NextHash), Quinn Simmons (Trek-Segafredo), Rui Oliveira and Jan Polanc (UAE Team Emirates) all getting out front.

With Team BikeExchange working on the front of the peloton behind, the break had made it up to two minutes in front by the time they reached the Alto de Barbeitos. Any hopes of a fourth stage win for green jersey Fabio Jakobsen (Deceuninck-QuickStep) were already over, though, with the Dutchman dropping on the climbs and falling to over five minutes back.

Cort, Aru and Cherel had taken the points over the classified climbs, though none of the men were in any position to disrupt the DSM hegemony at the top of the mountain classification as Michael Storer and Romain Bardet continued in the top two spots.

The rolling roads continued after the Barbeitos, and a small group attempted to go clear at the front, though they had no luck in getting away at just over 100 kilometres to go. Meanwhile, BikeExchange were joined by DSM in control of the peloton, the two teams looking to bring it all back for a reduced sprint finish later on.

At the 50-kilometres to go mark, several riders – including Aru on the third-last race day of his career – were dropped from the break after attacks by Simmons and Oliveira. BikeExchange continued at the front, closing to within a minute and making the race look certain to conclude with a bunch sprint.

At 43 to go, Louis Meintjes (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert) was among several riders to fall victim to a crash in the peloton, the South African sadly forced out of the race from tenth place overall. Ion Izagirre (Astana-Premier Tech) was caught up in a separate crash shortly afterwards but was able to get back up and continue.

Simmons, having already tried an attack to whittle down the breakaway, went again at 35 kilometres to go, bringing Oliveira with him and totally splintering the group. The duo hit the day's intermediate sprint along 16 seconds up on Cort, Bagioli, Craddock, Roux and Kron, though the quintet made it across soon after.

The seven men had a slender lead of just half a minute as they hit the 20-kilometres to go mark, and with BikeExchange not making much headway into the gap, it looked as though it might be a triumph for the break on the largely downhill run to the finish.

However, at 16 kilometres out, DSM moved to the front to join the Australian squad to work for their fast man Alberto Dainese as BikeExchange continued on behalf of Michael Matthews. The two teams managed to slice 10 seconds off the break's advantage, but they looked to be struggling to close it fully.

Inside the final 10 kilometres, the gap was back up to 30 seconds as the seven men up front continued to work well together in pursuit of a potential victory. Five kilometres later, the gap still hadn't changed, leaving the breakaway all but certain to contest the win in the final kilometres.

Craddock drove the break towards the line on behalf of teammate Craddock, and it was only with 200 metres to go that the breakaway riders struck out for the win. Despite Simmons' best efforts to take off early and sprint a surprise, though, Cort – the favourite in a dash to the line – prevailed as expected to win his sixth career Vuelta stage.