Sepp Kuss feared that his Visma teammates would destroy him on his favorite terrain: "It was a huge effort"
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Follow us on GooglePick any climb with gradients above ten percent, and Sepp Kuss will inevitably show up. The 30-year-old American from Visma | Lease a Bike was still going strong when only João Almeida, teammate Jonas Vingegaard, and Jai Hindley remained at the front on the legendary Angliru. Kuss eventually finished fourth, putting him back in the top ten.
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Kuss, who of course surprisingly won the Vuelta in 2023, has already shown himself to be among the better climbers in this race. But as good as he was on Friday, we hadn't seen Kuss perform that well in a while. “I always look forward to this day, even though I'm always a little scared. I love these steep climbs, they get me excited,” he laughed afterwards.
After a chat with the defeated Vingegaard, Kuss concluded that Visma | Lease a Bike had done everything it could to help its leader win. “Fortunately, my legs felt great, even though Dylan and Wilco rode at such an incredible pace in the first three hours that I wondered if I was going to survive,” he said, referring to the hard work of Van Baarle and Kelderman in part 1 of the stage.
Tom Pidcock had also indicated that Van Baarle was hurting the peloton, making the Angliru perhaps even more of a man-to-man battle than expected. “It was a huge effort; before, the pace was even higher in the final. Jonas looked good,” Kuss observed, despite the Dane in his red jersey being unable to win.
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Visma | Lease a Bike sees Jai Hindley advancing in the Vuelta
After the Angliru, it seems increasingly realistic that the battle for the overall victory in the Vuelta will be a duel between Vingegaard and Almeida. Behind them, it's all very close. Matteo Jorgenson dropped out of the top ten on behalf of Visma, but Kuss moved up to tenth place thanks to his fourth-place finish. He is just over three minutes behind Pidcock in third place.
Besides Kuss, Jai Hindley was the man of the day for the GC. The Australian from Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe finished third and moved up to fourth place in the rankings. For a long time, Kuss was able to keep pace with the 2022 Giro winner after Almeida and Vingegaard had dropped the pair. “He didn't surprise me, Hindley is a great rider, especially on climbs like this.”
“It was an honor to be on his wheel,” Kuss laughed, realizing that, in addition to Vingegaard, he also has a good chance of achieving a strong GC result himself. “My GC is looking better, too. I lost almost a minute every day in the first week, but now the steeper climbs are emerging in this Vuelta.”
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Bram van der PloegEditor-in-chief
Bram van der Ploeg (35) is the proud founder of In de Leiderstrui, IDL Pro Cycling's parent site, launched in 2018. Finally, he could create stories about the sport he had followed since childhood. He is the editor-in-chief on paper, but prefers to be with his recorder next to a rider, a team bus, or in the mud at a cyclocross race. Every year, from February to the end of May, Bram follows the entire Italian cycling season, from the Trofeo Laigueglia to the Giro d'Italia, with the grand finale in October in Lombardy. During that time, he lives in Tuscany, where he has since come to call Italy his 'home'.
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