{"id":767036,"date":"2026-09-11T07:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T07:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/767036\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T07:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T07:48:12","slug":"wout-van-aert-knows-why-he-didnt-win-the-vuelta-time-trial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/767036\/","title":{"rendered":"Wout van Aert knows why he didn’t win the Vuelta time trial"},"content":{"rendered":"

Wout van Aert<\/a> went all out for the win in the time trial during Stage 18 of the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<\/a>. However, the Belgian rider from Visma | Lease a Bike<\/a> reached his limits and thus had to settle for fifth place. Afterward, Van Aert was able to explain exactly what had gone wrong.<\/p>\n

Van Aert has already won two stages in this Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a, helped teammate Matthew Brennan secure five stage wins, and has long been in contention for the green points jersey. In the individual time trial of just over 32 kilometers, Van Aert can therefore go all out with a clear head in the race against the clock.<\/p>\n

Wout van Aert: ‘It was nice to give it a try’At the first intermediate checkpoint, the gap between stage winner Stefan K\u00fcng (Tudor) and Van Aert was just 5 seconds; at the second intermediate checkpoint, Van Aert was still the second-fastest, 7 seconds behind, but at the finish line the gap was 19 seconds. \u201cI have to be happy with this top-five finish; I have no regrets,\u201d he said in the flash interview<\/a>.<\/p>\n

To have a chance at another stage win, Van Aert knew he had to do things differently than the others. \u201cI knew I had to start fast if I wanted to win the stage. Because of that, I kind of burned out a bit in the final stretch. I already knew from how I felt that I was riding too slowly to win. But it was nice to give it a try.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the video<\/p>\n

Wout van Aert has already secured the green jerseyThere was still something to celebrate on Thursday for Van Aert, who, by finishing in the top 9, built an insurmountable lead in the points classification<\/a>. If the Belgian stays in the race and finishes the last three stages, the green jersey is his in Granada. \u201cI didn\u2019t know that, but it\u2019s a nice bonus to take into those final stages.\u201d<\/p>\n

Van Aert promised to focus on his teammates during the final two mountain stages on Friday and Saturday. The mountain classification no longer seems to be an option. \u201cI\u2019ll focus on Sepp and J\u00f8rgen,\u201d he said, referring to Kuss and Nordhagen, who will go on the attack in search of stage victory. \u201cThey still have a chance to win. I\u2019ll keep my eyes on Sunday.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wout van Aert went all out for the win in the time trial during Stage 18 of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":767037,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55,45702,231743,8783],"class_list":["post-767036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-visma-lease-a-bike","tag-vuelta-a-espana-2026","tag-wout-van-aert"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767036","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=767036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767036\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/767037"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}