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4 Vuelta a España storylines to follow in the final week
With only a few days of racing to go in the 2024 Vuelta a España, it couldn’t be much closer at the top of the GC table. After a gutsy defence of his red jersey on the slopes of the Covadonga, Ben O’Connor now leads Primož Roglič by a margin of just five seconds.
As the race speeds towards its conclusion in Madrid, here are four storylines to follow:
The podium fight
This Vuelta is certainly entertaining with a handful of stages still to go. After O’Connor launched his blistering solo breakaway to work his way into the maillot rojo on Stage 6, he has so far defended it heroically from the stampeding Roglič.
It hasn’t been easy. Roglič has shaken off a 20sec time penalty received for drafting after Stage 15 and is licking his lips at the chance to jump away once more. He’ll have plenty of opportunities and is bolstered by his strong teammates, especially Aleksandr Vlasov, who are supporting him far more compared to O’Connor, who often seems isolated from his squad.
The race continues in the high mountains over the remainder of the third week, where Roglič is in his element and where he will aim to win the red jersey for the fourth time in his career. His chances look high and even more so with the individual time-trial on the last day considering the lack of time-trialling quality in the rest of the top ten.
It’s very close for third place too. Enric Mas, Richard Carapaz and Mikel Landa all sit within less than a minute of each other, and have been attacking each other relentlessly at this Vuelta and will continue to do so. And there’s plenty of time for one of them to crack the top two if O’Connor continues to lose time.
A hotly contested white jersey
The youth classification is another close competition. After 16 stages, three riders sit within one minute of each other. Carlos Rodríguez has moved back into the white jersey, with Lidl-Trek’s Mattias Skjelmose breathing down his neck only 7sec behind and Roglič’s young teammate Florian Lipowitz just 34sec back.
These three riders have occupied the top three spots in the classification since Antonio Tiberi’s abandonment with heat stroke during Stage 9. A chasm then opens to the rest, with Israel-Premier Tech’s Matthew Riccitello sitting fourth, over 53 minutes behind Rodríguez.
Ineos Grenadiers entered the Vuelta with Rodríguez and Thymen Arensman as co-leaders. Arensman abandoned with Covid-19 prior to Stage 11 and Rodríguez sits a strong seventh in the general classification, 3min 56sec down on current race leader O’Connor. While he was distanced from the favourites early on the slopes of the Covadonga, he battled on to finish only 11sec behind. It’s this kind of resilience that has seen him finish in the top seven of every Grand Tour he’s ridden. He won’t let the youth classification lead slip without a fight.
But Skjelmose is equally determined. He just bunny-hopped Lipowitz in the standings after a particularly strong performance on Lagos de Covadonga and his strengths lie in the sort of terrain we have ahead of us, particularly with the final stage individual time-trial around Madrid, a discipline in which he is the Danish National Champion. He’s also experienced at the WorldTour level, having already won a staggering amount of youth classifications as well as the overall at last year’s Tour de Suisse.
Lipowitz meanwhile has enjoyed four days in the white jersey since the start of the Vuelta. He was stable in second place for a while but Skjelmose has been steadily gaining time on him, largely helped by the brutally steep summit finish to Cuitu Negru on Stage 15.
Are the mountains and points classifications over?
At the start of Stage 16, Wout van Aert held both the points and mountains jerseys. The mountains classification was shaping up to be a particularly entertaining fight, with both Van Aert and UAE’s Jay Vine on the same number of points. Van Aert was an attacking force throughout the day, increasing his lead, but a painful crash on one of the descents forced him to abandon.
Vine now leads the mountains classification by 14 points from teammate Marc Soler. There’s plenty more points up for grabs over the next few days but it seems likely the jersey will, at the very least, stay within the team.
As for the points classification, the green jersey is now on the shoulders of Kaden Groves. The Alpecin-Deceuninck rider leads the classification by a mammoth 87 points from Astana Qazaqstan’s Harold Tejada. Barring disaster, Groves is locked in to win it.
What can’t Max Poole do?
Max Poole is having an exceptional Vuelta. The young Brit started with a top ten on Stage 7, topped that with a third place on Stage 11 and went one better the next day with a second place on Stage 12.
Then on the epic stage to Lagos de Covadonga, he made the breakaway, fought alongside Soler and Filippo Zana, and finished a fine third place on the day.
The DSM-Firmenich-PostNL squad came into this race with Poole as their man for the general classification, but given he’s just 21 there was little pressure on him to get results. Poole has risen to the task impressively, and the Vuelta has provided an environment for him to thrive. He has been one of the standout riders on his Grand Tour debut and is an exciting prospect for the future. Expect more surprises from him as the race continues.
For more, visit our Vuelta a España hub page.
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