Vingegaard honest after Vuelta mountain stage: "I wasn’t going for victory today"

Vingegaard let his domestiques Wilco Kelderman and Dylan van Baarle take their foot off the gas in the opening phase, giving the leading group, including Soler, enough of a lead for the Spaniard to hold on until the finish. Visma | Lease a Bike also opted for a defensive tactic on the final climb, as domestiques Sepp Kuss and Ben Tulett explained.

“We didn't want to go for the stage win and wanted to save Dylan and Wilco in particular, after all the work they've already done,” explained the team leader. “Overall, our plan went very well, we can say that. I'm glad it's over and there's one more day to go before the rest day. We have to stay focused on Sunday, and then we'll get some rest on Monday.”

“Second place today is definitely better than yesterday,” said Vingegaard, who finished behind Almeida on Angliru on Friday. “I wasn't going for the win today. So second place is a nice bonus, if you can call it that. I gained two seconds on Joao, which isn't bad.”

“It's a good day for us to get through. We expected UAE Team Emirates-XRG to take over because they were very strong on Angliru. And Soler had enough of a lead to take the win, so I wasn't shocked that they took over,” said the Dane, shedding light on the tactics of the competition.

Vingegaard felt good. “It went pretty well, actually. I think my legs were okay. Here on the last climb, they try it, but we knew there would be a headwind, and it's just hard to make a difference when there's a lot of resistance. Then it takes too much effort to ride the others out of the wheel. I think the UAE realized that, too. At least, that's how I feel"

“Then Hindley finally tried it; he rode really hard. But I was happy that I could still get the bonus seconds at the end. I knew I had to wait until the end because of the wind,” said the Dane, who managed to pass the Aussie from Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe at the end and also overtook Almeida. In the GC, Vingegaard is now 48 seconds ahead of his big rival Almeida. ”