{"id":748406,"date":"2026-08-24T17:46:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T17:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/748406\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T17:46:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T17:46:08","slug":"vuelta-a-espana-giant-hail-forces-stage-three-abandonment-in-pyrenees-vuelta-a-espana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/748406\/","title":{"rendered":"Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a: giant hail forces stage three abandonment in Pyrenees | Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">A torrential hailstorm in the French Pyrenees forced the abandonment of the \u2060third stage of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/sport\/vuelta-a-espana\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<\/a> on Monday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">With 15 kilometres (9.32 miles) remaining of the 174km route \u2060from Gruissan to Font-Romeu, the \u200bskies darkened as the peloton neared the top of the Col de Mont-Louis and huge hailstones began \u2060bouncing off the tarmac and pelting the riders.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Mats Wenzel (Kern Pharma) and Lorenzo Fortunato (XDS Astana) were 25 seconds ahead \u2060of the peloton when the elements intervened as the race leader and favourite \u200bTadej Pogacar was seen indicating \u200cto the peloton \u200cto pull off the course.<\/p>\n<p>A view of the finish line following the stage cancellation. Photograph: Alexander Hassenstein\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Bedraggled riders were then seen getting off their \u200cbikes and shuffling into a hotel for shelter, leaving fans frustrated at the finish where thick layers of hail blanketed the road.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">\u201cFor the security of the riders, stage three has been cancelled due to hail and severe weather,\u201d race organisers said shortly afterwards. \u201cThere will be no winner and no podium ceremony.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Pogacar (UAE Emirates-XRG) retained his overall lead of nine seconds from the Belgian rider \u200cWout van Aert (Dutch Visma-Lease a Bike) with the British rider Matt Brennan 10sec back.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Earlier it had been warm and sunny \u200bon the flat approaches to the mountainous finish with no sign of the chaos to come as a five-man breakaway group stayed out ahead.<\/p>\n<p>Quick GuideHow do I sign up for sport breaking news alerts?Show<\/p>\n<p>In the Guardian app, tap the Profile settings button at the top right, then select Notifications. Turn on sport notifications.<\/p>\n<p>If you already have the Guardian app, make sure you\u2019re on the most recent version.<\/p>\n<p>If you don&#8217;t have the Guardian app, download it from the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/app\/the-guardian\/id409128287?mt=8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">iOS App Store<\/a>\u00a0on iPhone or the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/play.google.com\/store\/apps\/details?id=com.guardian\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Google Play store<\/a>\u00a0on Android by searching for &#8216;The Guardian&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Thank you for your feedback.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Pogacar, bidding to complete his Grand Tour collection by winning the Vuelta \u2060for the first time, was always near the front of \u200bthe pack with \u200bthe Slovenian\u2019s team setting the pace.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">His expected challenge for the stage victory fell foul \u200bof the \u200cweather in an \u200banticlimactic finish. Pogacar \u200bwill get his chance to underline his superiority again on Tuesday, though, with stage four featuring three first-category climbs as the race starts and finishes in Andorra la Vella.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A torrential hailstorm in the French Pyrenees forced the abandonment of the \u2060third stage of the Vuelta a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":748407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-748406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=748406"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748406\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/748407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=748406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=748406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=748406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}