Primoz Roglic wins the Vuelta a España

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Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) clinched his third consecutive Vuelta a España title on Sunday evening, sealing the hat trick with victory in the final-stage time trial into Santiago de Compostela. 

The Galician city represents the destination of the most famous pilgrimage in Christianity, and Roglič capped his own journey into the history books with his fourth stage win of this year’s race, neatly bookending a near-faultless three weeks that started with victory against the clock in Burgos. 

Aboard his golden Cervélo, the Olympic champion breezed past his closest GC rival Enric Mas (Movistar) who’d started two minutes in front, as he entered the cathedral square, underlining his superiority on the day and over the three weeks. 

He stopped the clock on 44:02 at the end of the undulating 33.8km course to beat Magnus Cort (EF Education-Nippo), who’d spent most of the day in the hotseat, by 14 seconds. Thymen Arensman (Team DSM), finished 52 seconds down to take the final spot on the day’s podium, as the only other rider within a minute of the winning time.

With more than two minutes’ damage inflicted on Mas, Roglič extended his final winning margin to 4:42, marking a new level of dominance after his 2:33 lead on Alejandro Valverde in 2019 and his shaky 24 seconds on Richard Carapaz last year. 

“It’s unbelievable. It’s crazy. Sometimes you win by a lot, sometimes you win by really a little, but as long as you can win it’s super nice,” said Roglić, who becomes the fourth rider to win three Vueltas, after Tony Rominger, Roberto Heras, and Alberto Contador. “I’m not focusing on numbers and statistics but I’m honoured to be in that place,” he added. 

If the top two steps of the podium were in little doubt, Jack Haig (Bahrain Victorious) successfully fended off Adam Yates (Ineos Grenadiers) to seal third overall and the best result of his career. The Australian, who’d started with an advantage of 1:10, had a nervy start as Yates went 25 seconds faster at the early checkpoint, but he later turned the tables and ended up beating Yates on the stage by 26 seconds. The 27-year-old, who crashed out of the Tour de France with a broken collarbone, therefore sealed his first Grand Tour podium, 7:40 in arrears of Roglič. 

Elsewhere in the top 10, Gino Mader (Bahrain Victorious) dug in to seal fifth place and the white jersey for best young rider, finishing just before Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) produced one of his best time trial performances to take sixth on the day and sixth overall. Bernal had overtaken Sepp Kuss (Jumbo-Visma), who’d started two minutes in front and suffered a torrid time trial. The American slipped a place in the final standings, with David de la Cruz (UAE Team Emirates) jumping from ninth to seventh, also picking off Guillaume Martin (Cofidis), who had a typically weak effort against the clock. Felix Grossschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) produced a strong ride to place seventh on the stage and to cap a dream Vuelta by rounding out the final top 10, even if it was more than 22 minutes down on Roglič.

How it unfolded

The final time trial, starting in Padrón and finishing in Santiago de Compostela, measured 33.8km, with plenty of up and down. 

After a flattish opening 10km, there was a gradual 5km climb and a subsequent fast 5km descent. A little while later came a shorter, sharper climb, then a plateau and a near-constant 4km drag to the line. There were two intermediate timing checkpoints, the first at kilometre-12 and the second at kilometre-24.

Riders set off in reverse order of the general classification, with intervals of one minute, up to the last 20 riders, who were separated by two minutes. As the last rider on GC, Josef Cerny (Deceuninck-QuickStep) was the first rider down the start ramp in Padrón at 17:02 local time, and the Czech rider duly went straight into a hotseat with a strong opening time of 45:18. 

Chad Haga (Team DSM) was the first rider to get within 27 seconds of Cerny but suddenly Cort blew his time out of the water. Half a minute up at both checkpoints, the Dane, in flying form and with three stage wins in the bag already, ended up toppling him by just over a minute. 

Arensman later went into second place, as DSM and EF dominated the top of the leaderboard, but even that was 38 seconds slower than Cort. Fabio Aru (Qhubeka-NextHash) then rolled through four minutes down to bring an end to his career. 

There was relatively little movement at the top of the leaderboard all the way through to the upper echelons of the general classification. As the overall leader, Roglič was the last down the ramp at 19:43, and the Olympic champion stated his intent by going 20 seconds faster than Cort through the first checkpoint. By the second checkpoint, he was still well on track, 17 seconds up on Cort and well clear of any of his GC rivals. He then suffered a slight wobble and almost pressed the self-destruct button when he nearly took a wrong turn, but he looked up and corrected it just in time.

Yates started strongly and was 25 seconds up on Haig at the first checkpoint. However, by the second checkpoint, the trend had been reversed and the margin was down to 14 seconds. 

Grossschartener was the first top-10 rider to finish and he produced a strong ride to go fifth on the stage at the time and successfully defend his 10th place from Odd Christian Eiking (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert). De la Cruz was the next rider home and, as widely expected, he comfortably ate into the eight-second gap needed to leapfrog Guillaume Martin into eighth overall. The Spaniard even worked his way up to seventh, as Kuss struggled on the course and was overtaken by Bernal, who was producing one of the best time trials of his career. 

The gap between Bernal and Mader was too big to bridge and the Swiss talent rode a solid time trial to seal a first Grand Tour top-five finish, collecting the white jersey of best young rider for his efforts. Yates then finished his ride before Haig came home for his first Grand Tour podium finish and the best result of his career. 

That left just Mas and Roglič, and the red jersey was going so fast he had his closest rival in his sights in the closing kilometres, having started two minutes behind. He crossed the line and jumped off his bike, before raising both arms in the air and letting out a roar.