Red Bulls' wings begin to flutter: "It's incredible to be at the front with Vingegaard, and Almeida"

Thanks to his performance, Pellizzari was able to claim the white jersey for yet another day in a row and therefore also passed through the mixed zone. There, the number six from the recent Giro d'Italia looked back on the stage with great enthusiasm. “Today was really hard from the start but I felt really good in the finale. For me, it’s incredible to be at the front on a climb with [Jonas] Vingegaard, [Joao] Almeida… .”

Pellizzari discovered himself in the Giro as a GC contender and although he came to this Vuelta to work for Hindley, there may also be something in store for him. “We are really happy we dropped someone,” he said, referring to Felix Gall (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) and Egan Bernal (INEOS Grenadiers), among others. Marc Soler (UAE) and Lorenzo Fortunato (Astana) also lost time and dropped out of the top ten.

On Wednesday, a tough stage around Bilbao is on the program. And it is slowly becoming clear which riders we can expect to see at the front as the race gets tougher. Vingegaard and Almeida are doing well, and Tom Pidcock (Q36.5) also looks very strong. Behind them, riders such as Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek), the two Red Bulls, and the young American Matthew Riccitello seem to be evenly matched. “Matthew is really strong. We’ve been fighting for a few years already and now he’s just 30 seconds behind me,” said Pellizzari.

Whereas in the first week the young Italian insisted he wanted to fight for Hindley and a stage victory, a Vuelta classification seems to be becoming more and more of a goal. “We’ll keep fighting and I hope I can manage it,” he said, referring to the white youth jersey, for which Riccitello is also his main competitor. “Today, we were both in the front group, and we’ve had a good first part of La Vuelta. We’ll see what happens next.”