Ayuso knows where he went wrong against Seixas as Almeida rues teammate’s crash

After the finish, Seixas suggested it felt like the Spaniard and the Portuguese rider weren’t immediately willing to work with him. Was it tactical, or simply a matter of not being able to do more?

Ayuso was the first to go on the offensive in the finale, but he couldn’t shake Seixas. “I already knew beforehand he would be one of the rivals, and he proved it again,” the Lidl-Trek leader explained. “He was smarter than me at the end: I knew I had to take the second-to-last corner first, but he still managed to get the better of me.”

“When I launched my sprint, I was already a few bike lengths back,” Ayuso admitted. “But he deserved it. On Friday I’ve got a new chance in the time trial — and in the end it’s all about winning the race on the final day.”

Almeida finished second on the Alto da Fóia last year on home roads, and this time had to settle for third. “It was a hard climb,” the Portuguese rider said. “It was a lot of stop-and-go, a bit irregular.”

He also felt UAE Team Emirates–XRG lost a key card when Brandon McNulty hit the deck. “It’s a shame Brandon McNulty crashed, because I think he would definitely have been with me and then we could have played things a bit more,” Almeida continued. “I tried, but I was missing something. In the end I’m happy with the result, and I’m looking forward to the time trial.”