Richard Carapaz attacks from breakaway to win stage 12 at Vuelta a España atop Estepona summit

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With a summit victory atop Peñas Blancas on stage 12 of the Vuelta a España, Richard Carapaz rescued what has been an uncharacteristically poor opening half to his race.

Lying in 24th place, the Ecuadorian lay well out of the GC battle at the start of the day, but he proved the strongest man from the breakaway on the 19km climb in Andalucía to soar to his first-ever Vuelta stage victory.

Carapaz picked his spot to jump, racing away from the remains of a breakaway move that had been whittled down by pacemaking from Bora-Hansgrohe and attacks from Arkéa-Samsic rider Elie Gesbert. He made his move 2km from the finish and was unmatched in the race to the line, finishing alone to take his third win of the season.

Wilco Kelderman (Bora-Hansgrohe) finished second, nine seconds down, while UAE Team Emirates duo Marc Soler and Jan Polanc rolled home in third and fourth at 24 and 26 seconds. As a result of the breakaway's ride and the subsequent massive time gap to the GC contenders, Kelderman and Polanc vaulted into the top 10, taking sixth and ninth overall, respectively.

After 7:39 when Carapaz had crossed the line, it was race leader Remco Evenepoel (QuickStep-AlphaVinyl) who led the GC favourites across the line. The 22-year-old had crashed 50km from the line but showed no sign of any after-effects on the long climb to the finish, easily matching the few moves made by his rivals before leading the group home.

Evenepoel easily retains the red jersey, having led home Enric Mas (Movistar), Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma), Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates), and Miguel Angel López (Astana Qazaqstan).

Ineos Grenadiers leader Carlos Rodríguez lost contact in the closing metres of the stage, shedding 11 seconds but retaining his place. The likes of Tao Geoghegan Hart (Ineos Grenadiers), João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates), and Ben O'Connor (AG2R Citroën) would lose more time, though, having dropped away at over 2km from the finish.

How it unfolded

Stage 12 of the Vuelta a España marked a return to the mountains for the peloton, with another summit finish on the menu at Peñas Blancas above the Andalucían town of Estepona.

With the 192.7km stage largely running west along the Alboran coast, much of the day would be run on flat roads. Barring a few hills near the start of the stage and a steady, unclassified climb north of Marbella, the day would be all about the final climb.

The general classification battle would be set to ignite once again on Peñas Blancas, not a typically sharp and brutal Vuelta climb but instead a long and steady mountain, measuring 19km with an average of 6.7% and even gradients for the most part.

After the flag dropped to kick off the action following the departure from Salobreña, the attacks came from the very start. Xabier Azparren (Euskaltel-Euskadi) was the first man to try a move, but his attack – as well as one shortly after featuring Richard Carapaz (Ineos Grenadiers) and Jay Vine (Alpecin-Deceuninck) – wouldn't stick so early on.

Instead, the move would take almost 40km to fully form, and when it did it was a big one with 32 men making the breakaway. Vine – who had previously triumphed at Pico Jano and Colláu Fancuaya – made it, as did a host of other strong climbers including Carapaz, Wilco Kelderman (Bora-Hansgrohe), Alexey Lutsenko (Astana Qazaqstan), and Marc Soler (UAE Team Emirates).

Vine and Soler were joined by two teammates each in the group, while other notable names up front included Jan Polanc (UAE Team Emirates), Samuele Battistella (Astana Qazaqstan), Elie Gesbert (Arkéa-Samsic), Matteo Fabbro (Bora-Hansgrohe), Marco Brenner (Team DSM), James Shaw (EF Education-EasyPost), Carl Frederik Hagen (Israel-Premier Tech), Lawson Craddock (BikeExchange-Jayco), and Louis Vervaeke (QuickStep-AlphaVinyl).

After an opening hour run at over 47 kph, the situation settled down with the break sticking away, while three minutes back in the 104-rider peloton QuickStep-AlphaVinyl controlling the peloton on behalf of race leader Evenepoel.

The gap would only grow during the mid-part of the stage, with the break continuing to zip along at 47 kph, adding another two minutes to their advantage shortly after passing through the 100km to go marker in Málaga.

With the intermediate sprint of the day only coming right at the start of the climb in Estepona, there was little for the breakaway to fight over before the end. However, Battistella decided to make a move on the gradually ascending unclassified climb at 67km to go.

The Italian, who was a runner-up from the break on stages 7 and 9, swiftly built a gap of 55 seconds over his break-mates as he raced over the top of the hill. Alpecin-Deceuninck were the team to lead the chase from behind, with Lionel Taminiaux and Gianni Vermeersch put to work for KOM leader Vine.

At over 10 minutes down the road, meanwhile, Evenepoel was caught up in a spill, sliding out on a downhill bend and cutting his right thigh and arm. He was back up and running quickly, while the peloton – which already had no desire whatsoever to haul in the break – waited up for him.

Following the descent was the flat 27km run-in to Estepona, which brought Battistella's time at the head of the race to an end. The Italian was caught at 43km to go – 24km away from the start of the climb – thanks to the work of Alpecin-Deceuninck and UAE Team Emirates.

QuickStep-AlphaVinyl, bolstered by Vervaeke dropping back from the break, were swiftly back on the front of the peloton after Evenepoel made it back in following his spill, though the group was at that point 11:30 on the break. At that point, breakaway rider Kelderman was up on the virtual podium, having sat 14:04 down on GC in the morning.

The climb to Peñas Blancas

By the time the breakaway hit the base of the climb, having raced through Estepona, the group still had 10:45 on the peloton and were certain to contest the stage victory ahead of the GC battlers.

With some of the steeper stretches of the climb coming towards the start and with Bora-Hansgrohe pushing at the front, it was no surprise that riders dropped away in quick succession. Fabbro put in all the work to spit rider after rider out the back.

Back in the peloton Rohan Dennis was called into action for his team leader Roglič, while QuickStep-AlphaVinyl remained up front too, the combined efforts of the teams chewing two minutes off the break's lead as Movistar also joined the fray for Mas.

As the riders edged towards the midway point of the climb, more and more were left behind by Fabbro's pacemaking, with Lutsenko and Craddock among those gone by the 11km mark, with Shaw gone not long after.

With 7km to go, Fabbro still led the break with Kelderman, Carapaz, Hagen, Brenner, Soler, Polanc, Vine, and Gesbert in his wheel still at nine minutes up on the peloton. There, 3km down the mountain, Evenepoel and Mas enjoyed the company of two domestiques, while Roglič was already isolated in the group of 20 or so men.

Fabbro's job was done 5km from the finish as Gesbert put in an attack, sending Soler and Hagen out the back too. Countering an effort from Polanc, Gesbert went again a kilometre later, gaining a small gap as Vine and Polanc dropped away.

Back in the peloton Mas was putting on the pressure with just over 6km to go, the Spaniard looking around to find Evenepoel and López on his wheel as Roglič and the other major GC contenders chased back on.

As the GC battle erupted, Carapaz made his move 2km from the finish, shortly after the chasers caught Gesbert. Rather than try multiple efforts, the Ecuadorian picked his spot to go all-out to devastating effect. Kelderman was closest, but the Olympic champion had too much for any of his chasers to make it back, and he'd celebrate a victory in his final Grand Tour for Ineos.

Back down the climb, the GC favourites had come together after the brief attack earlier on, with all the top nine in the standings racing together into the final 3km, led by the Ineos duo of Geoghegan Hart and Rodríguez.

With 1.5km to go it was Evenepoel who took it up at the front, showing to his rivals that his earlier crash hadn't hindered his climbing ability. Only Mas, Rodríguez, Ayuso, Roglič, and López stuck with him at that point, with the likes of Almeida and Geoghegan Hart having dropped.

The Belgian pulled the group into the final kilometre with no difficulties and sprinted for the line with his rivals following his wheel all the way. The 15- and 14-place jumps from Kelderman and Polanc would be the biggest GC movements of the stage, with the top five remaining in situ.

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