BAIONA, Spain (AP) — Wout van Aert’s third stage win in the Spanish Vuelta this year was a special one, coming in front of his family.
With relatives in attendance on Tuesday, Van Aert made his move over the summits of Galicia to win the 10th stage, with Ben O’Connor keeping the overall lead for a fifth straight day.
Aert had a dominant performance through the 160-kilometer (99.4-mile) mountain stage from Ponteareas to Baiona in Spain’s northwest. He had already won the third and seventh stages.
“It’s not too often that I can win when my family visits me on a race, so it makes it extra special and really nice,” the Belgian rider from team Visma-Lease a Bike said. “It was really my aim to be in the breakaway but I had a hard time on the first climb. I almost gave up but I gave it one more try just before the top. I think it worked in my favor because in the finale, the climbers in my group didn’t have fresh legs and that’s how I won.”
Van Aert’s first stage win had come in a sprint while the Vuelta was still in Portugal, and the second came with a reduced bunch in the southern Spanish region of Andalusia. This time, Van Aert got the better of Frenchman Quentin Pacher from team Groupama-FDJ, who was his last breakaway opponent.
Van Aert now has 12 victories in Grand Tours, including nine in the Tour de France.
O’Connor, of team Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale, safely held on to the leader’s red jersey for a fifth straight day, setting a new record for an Australian rider. Bradley McGee led the race for four days in 2005.
O’Connor maintained a lead of nearly four minutes over three-time Vuelta champion Primoz Roglic of team Red Bull Bora Hansgrohe.
“In the end, it was the perfect scenario,” O’Connor said. “It was a really hard start, it took a long time for the break to go. A lot of guys in the top 10 were interested in the breakaway so I think we did a good job today to control the start. Other teams were trying to stay in position so we did the descents full gas, the pace was pretty hard onto the second climb and then it pretty much stopped. It was about staying in position.”
Riders were coming off the first rest day of the three-week race that ends in Madrid on Sept. 8.
Wednesday’s 11th stage will be a 166.5-kilometer route with three category-two climbs in Galicia.
___
AP sports: https://apnews.com/sports
Copyright © 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.
