{"id":889951,"date":"2026-09-13T01:20:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-13T01:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/889951\/"},"modified":"2026-09-13T01:20:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-13T01:20:10","slug":"enric-mas-heads-for-vuelta-glory-after-extending-lead-on-penultimate-stage-vuelta-a-espana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/889951\/","title":{"rendered":"Enric Mas heads for Vuelta glory after extending lead on penultimate stage | Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a"},"content":{"rendered":"

Enric Mas all but secured overall victory in the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<\/a> when he survived a brutal penultimate \u2060stage on the sun-baked slopes of the Sierra Nevada mountains. The 31-year-old Movistar rider spent most of the 186km stage in a group \u2060alongside Primoz Roglic, Felix \u2060Gall and \u200bRichard Carapaz \u2013 the only men who could deny him the red jersey \u2013 and simply refused to crack.<\/p>\n

Looking perfectly in control up the steep \u2060and winding final 9km climb to Collado del Alguacil, Mas comfortably protected the 1min 37sec advantage he had held over Roglic after \u206019 stages and even stretched his lead at the finish.<\/p>\n

With only Sunday\u2019s ceremonial stage around the \u200bcity of Granada to come, Mas looks \u200ccertain to become the first \u200cSpanish rider to win the Vuelta since Alberto Contador 12 years ago.<\/p>\n

The veteran Mikel Landa made it \u200ca perfect day for the home nation as the Soudal\u2013Quick-Step rider powered away from the breakaway group up the Collado del Alguacil to take the stage, his first victory since 2021.<\/p>\n

Mikel Landa enjoys his first stage win for five years. Photograph: Javier Liz\u00f3n\/EPA<\/p>\n

Mas inherited the red jersey when Tadej Pogacar, the overwhelming race favourite, crashed out on stage eight<\/a>. Since then he has barely put a pedal stroke out of place to finally shake off the tag \u200cof one of the best Spanish riders never to have won a Grand Tour, something he shares with Landa.<\/p>\n

There was still stage 20 to \u200bsurvive, though. A relentless day in the mountains featured four big climbs, including twice up the Puerto de El Purche, before the finale on the brutish Collado del Alguacil, a 17km climb with the last 8.3km averaging a leg-stinging 9.8%.<\/p>\n

The former Olympic champion Carapaz attacked throughout the day with his usual panache and \u2060Gall looked a threat to Mas. But the Spaniard was never flustered \u200band when he dropped the four-time \u200bVuelta champion Roglic in the final \u200bkilometres he knew the general classification battle was won.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the first time in \u200bmy life I feel \u200clike this,\u201d Mas \u200bsaid. \u201cTo be honest, \u200bI was just counting the kilometres. My feeling was super. The team did a super good job again. I won because the team did everything. Thank you.\u201d<\/p>\n

With just the 21st stage around Granada left, Mas holds a 2min 15sec lead over Roglic with Gall 2:44 in arrears.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Enric Mas all but secured overall victory in the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a when he survived a brutal penultimate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":889952,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,85],"class_list":["post-889951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/889951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=889951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/889951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/889952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=889951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=889951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=889951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}