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On Vuelta’s final road stage Eddie Dunbar takes brace of wins

UAE-Emirates teammates battle for KOM on penultimate day

September 7, 2024
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Saturday’s penultimate stage of the 2024 Vuelta a España was the final road stage, and Eddie Dunbar became the fifth rider to take multiple wins. There wasn’t much movement in the GC top 10, but Primož Roglič has one hand on the trophy, leading Ben O’Connor by 2:02 with only Sunday’s time trial finale to come.

The Course

Saturday’s profile for the final road stage resembled a shark’s lower jawbone, with seven categorized climbs spread evenly over 172 km and a summit finish atop Picón Blanco.

The profile was sure to elicit a breakaway. Before the first time, with Roglič’s main main Aleksandr Vlasov already suffering at the back of the peloton, a group busted loose. Interestingly, it contained the top two guys in the KOM classification, UAE-Emirates’ Marc Soler and Jay Vine. Vine would take over the lead on Cat. 3’s Las Estacas de Trueba and Puerto de la Braguía.

With Ineos doing the pace-making in the peloton, Vlasov was finally dropped. Up ahead, Vine scored again on Cat. 2 Alto de El Caracol. Soler trailed his teammate by six points. Hard on the heels of El Caracol was Cat. 1 Portillo de Lunada. Soler obviously wanted to win the title; he had attacked on El Caracol, and at the foot of Portillo de Lunada, he went again.

Soler wanted to keep his dots from teammate Vine. Photo: Sirotti

Behind, yet another team, Soudal-QuickStep, was the engine at the front of the peloton train. More bad news for Roglič was teammate Dani Martinez abandoning the race. Soler had company in the pesky Vine and Clément Berthet until he lit out on his own, taking 10 points to Vine’s 6. The gap was narrowed to two.

Next up was Cat. 2 Puerto de la Sía. Soler insisted on solitude. With two Cat. 1 ascents remaining, the score was Soler 76, Vine 76. Game on!

Soler skittered downhill towards the foot of the penultimate climb of the 79th edition, Puerto de los Tornos. The peloton was within 2:00 with the Vine chase in between. Soler’s average descending skills doomed him to company before Puerto de los Tornos. Soler, Vine, Berthet, double stage winner Pablo Castrillo and Marco Frigo started the ascent 1:30 ahead of the red jersey group. Two other Red Bull riders, Nico Denz and Patrick Gamper, abandoned. What was going on?

Soler couldn’t hang with the others and the peloton kept coming closer. When the pressure was on, Carlos Rodriguez and Matthias Skjelmose were dropped. Could Vine make it to the top after getting caught and snatch the blue polka dots at the eleventh hour? Skjelmose made it back but Rodriguez was on a bad day.

Vine scooped up the fourth-most KOM points and the dots were his.

Vine prevailed in the intra-squad KOM scrap. Photo: Sirotti

Tenth place Pavel Sivakov bolted on the others and pulled out 48 seconds by the foot of the final climb.

Picón Blanco

Soudal-QuickStep drove hard into the first slopes but Red Bull seized the reins. Dunbar made a move to bridge to Sivakov. Roglič went to the front, splintering the group. O’Connor was temporarily distanced. Dunbar and Sivakov formed a leading duo with 3.5 km to climb. David Gaudu and Stage 18 victor Urko Berrade surged clear just before Dunbar dropped Sivakov. Enric Mas counterattacked.

With 2000 meters remaining, the order was Dunbar, then Gaudu, then Roglič, Mas, Richard Carapaz and Berrade. Gaudu was absorbed by the red jersey gang and Berrade faded. O’Connor and his teammate Felix Gall came back. Dunbar clung onto his lead as Mas accelerated to drop O’Connor. Mikel Landa attacked to no avail.

Dunbar held on by seven seconds. Mas couldn’t overtake O’Connor to jump into second, and he has little chance to do it in the chrono.

The 2024 Vuelta concludes on Sunday with a fairly flat 24.6-km time trial in Madrid.

2024 Vuelta a España Stage 20
1) Eddie Dunbar (Ireland/Jayco-AlUla) 4:38:47
2) Enric Mas (Spain/Movistar) +0:07
3) Primož Roglič (Slovenia/Red Bull) +0:10

2024 Vuelta a España GC
1) Primož Roglič (Slovenia/Red Bull) 81:22:10
2) Ben O’Connor (Australian/Decathlon-AG2R) +2:02
3) Enric Mas (Spain/Movistar) +2:11
4) Richard Carapaz (Ecuador/EF Education-Easypost) +3:00
5) David Gaudu (France/Groupama-FDJ) +4:48