OFFICIAL Stage 14 Results: Sergio Higuita ABANDONS!

[Laurens De Jong]

Hello, Vuelta a España Gamers!

 

STAGE Grade: B-

 

I rate today’s stage a B. Giulio Ciccone and Egan Bernal continue to drop out of contention, surprisingly. Asturias is beautiful, we all know that. And there was some inside-cycling to enjoy.

 

Route: 4/5         GC: 2/5             Tactics: 2/5       Sprint: 0/5         Surprises: 2/5

 

 

There was another Ivo Oliveira type situation today. Caught between the 22-man breakaway and the peloton were a few riders. Xabier Azparren, Gijs Leemreize, and the unfortunate Victor Campenaerts. The latter had a puncture that dropped him out of the breakaway.

 

The peloton was about a minute behind the group. A former pro cyclist once explained this to me: as soon as the gap opens to a minute, all the team bosses with riders in between start telling the race director to send the team cars through.

 

Usually the cars are allowed between the breakaway and the chasers when the gap is a minute. But that’s not a rule. It’s up to the race director to allow or bar team cars in the gap. The trick is to pressure the race director into allowing those cars.

 

As soon as that happens, the riders in the gap will be as much in the way as they can. That way, the cars can pass only one at a time, the rider gets to draft for a few minutes, and then the cycle repeats. All those riders in their chasses-patates all of a sudden get supernatural legs and make it to the breakaway. Magic!

 

But today, for Campenaerts and Leemreize, that trick didn’t work. The Spanish TV kept their camera on Campenaerts. And that trick only works when nobody officially sees you do it. Azparren appeared in the breakaway a few kilometers later, but poor Campenaerts and Leemreize kept losing time.

 

Spanish TV gave up on their struggle and send their motard somewhere else along the course. And, hey presto, with no warning, Campenaerts and Leemreize belatedly did join the breakaway! Campenaerts on a new bike that he must have gotten from his team car. If only we could imagine what Campenaerts, Leemreize, and the team car did after the bike change. If only!

 

The fist bump between the two when they were in the peloton made me smile.

 

After that, it all settled down. It became clear that Team Visma | Lease-a-Bike had no intention to win the stage and they allowed the gap to be over six minutes. For some reason, Alpecin-Deceuninck was helping Visma with that gap. I’m waiting for someone to explain that to me. Minor teams sometimes punish their riders for not being in the breakaway, but this is Alpecin. I have no explanation.

 

Over twenty riders in the breakaway. Among them: Marc Soler. That made Soler the default winner of the stage. In cycling, you attack as late as possible, but before the others. Soler attacked on the bottom of the final climb, and never looked back. Those are the kinds of tactics you can afford when you also have the legs to go faster up the mountain than nearly anyone else.

 

The only riders who could beat Soler were minutes behind him. In the peloton, UAE Team Emirates – XRG was: one, working as a team. Including Juan Ayuso. And two, pushing up the pace to eliminate the likes of Ciccone and Bernal.

 

Emirates have won seven of the fourteen stages so far. As I’ve said before about them: they can win even when they get all the team tactics wrong. We now have to go back to the likes of Team Columbia–HTC in the 2009 Tour de France (six, all by Mark Cavendish), or Flandria – Latina in the 1977 Vuelta a España (fourteen, one by Michel Pollentier and the rest by Freddy Maertens) to see a dominant team of such proportions.

 

But okay, Soler won today’s stage. Behind him, Emirates was chasing to break everyone else — but it didn’t change much because Jonas Vingegaard was able to keep up with João Almeida and after Friday, this was already just a two-horse race. Opinions vary on who was the moral winner today. Almeida demonstrated that he’s not beaten. But Vingegaard demonstrated he can finish ahead of Almeida. Draw your own conclusions.

 

Andrea Bagioli was in the breakaway from the start. No need to surf the team cars. He represented Team Liz today, and he’s in the spotlight because no other team picked him.

 

Today’s team tactics put riders like Bagioli in the breakaway so they can help later on when their leader passes them. Like Wout van Aert and Simon Yates in this year’s Giro d’Italia. Giulio Ciccone was still eighth in the standings, worth fighting for. With help from a rider in the breakaway, perhaps.

 

If that was the plan, then I don’t understand why Bagioli went on the attack with 2.7 kilometers to go to the top of the Puertu de San Llaurienzu, and almost forty kilometers to the finish. Had Ciccone already let his team know his legs weren’t working that day? Two minutes later, Ciccone was dropped from the peloton. Thanks to UAE’s pace.

 

It was sad for Ciccone. Lidl-Trek directed Julien Bernard to drop back and pace Ciccone the rest of the way. Domestiques are here to ride for the team leader, but this must have been demoralizing for Ciccone.

 

Bagioli, meanwhile, lasted not much longer. The next time we saw him, three minutes later, he was back in the breakaway. Two minutes later, he was getting dropped. And that’s the last I saw of him. He finished 44^th, a place ahead of Bernard and two places ahead of Ciccone. That looks as if he dropped down to help, but he finished thirty seconds ahead of those two. Once again, I have no explanation. If you’re twenty minutes down, why not just wait for your teammates?

 

Watch the final kilometer HERE.

Watch the official La Vuelta highlights HERE.

Watch the extended NBC Sports highlights HERE.

Read the TNT Sports report HERE.

 

Team Will had selected Sergio Higuita. He had a decent Tour de France, so it wasn’t a bad pick. But back to back grand tours are hard. He had scored zero points in this game, and never looked like getting any more points. This abandon doesn’t really affect our game.

 

Team Dominic won the stage today. Most points from classifications, most points overall, most riders in the Top-25 (eight). They move into third. Behind them, and also with eight riders in the Top-25, were Team Charles. They remain second. In third were Team Tadej, who move up to sixth. And in fourth, with most points from the stage, Team Amalia, still eighth in the standings.

 

Team Samuel were fifth, remaining ninth in the standings. Team Grace were sixth, still seventh. Leaders Team Ansel finished seventh today, just ahead of Team Sylvia in eighth, which moves them up into twelfth place in the standings. Team Will were ninth, and they are still eleventh overall.

 

That’s the top nine and only 30 points separated those. It’s a very close game this time around!

 

Team Josh were tenth, dropping them to sixth. Team Hugo, once the leaders, were eleventh today and they go down to fourth in the standings. Team Sam were twelfth, still tenth overall. And Team Liz were thirteenth, dropping down to thirteenth in the standings.

 

Sunday’s race is classified as a mountain stage, but also has an expected mass sprint arrival. Meaning UCI sprint rules apply. There’s a category 1 climb, 16.5 kilometers at 5.1%, and a category 2 climb, 12.6 kilometers at 3.8%. After that, it is all Spanish flat. The sprint teams can be expected to bring their sprinters back to the peloton. Unless there’s a breakaway. Unless the sprinters are in that breakaway.

 

It all adds up to a Mads Pedersen kind of day. We’ve seen that he can battle up a climb or two. And then he’ll want to points at the intermediate sprint line, and again at the finish.

 

Standings after stage 14:

 

Rank	Name	Points	WAS	MOVES
1	Team Ansel*	2480	1	0
2	Team Charles*	2476	2	0
3	Team Dominic*	2419	4	1
4	Team Hugo*	2407	3	-1
5	Team Tadej*	2331	6	1
6	Team Josh*	2326	5	-1
7	Team Grace*	2303	7	0
8	Team Amalia*	2247	8	0
9	Team Samuel*	2230	9	0
10	Team Sam*	1801	10	0
11	Team Will*	1766	11	0
12	Team Sylvia*	1628	13	1
13	Team Liz*	1612	12	-1

 

Standings after stage 14 (including adults):

 

Rank	Name	Points	WAS	MOVES
1	Team Kari	2693	1	0
2	Team Kent	2620	2	0
3	Team Craig	2609	3	0
4	Team Mitchinson	2518	5	1
5	Team Ansel*	2480	4	-1
6	Team Charles*	2476	6	0
7	Team Adam	2468	9	2
8	Team Corsa	2461	10	2
9	Team Feng	2451	7	-2
10	Team Dominic*	2419	11	1
11	Team Hugo*	2407	8	-3
12	Team Chuck	2379	12	0
13	Team Tadej*	2331	15	2
14	Team Josh*	2326	13	-1
15	Team Grace*	2303	16	1
16	Team Amelia	2300	14	-2
17	Team Amalia*	2247	18	1
18	Team Corey	2234	20	2
19	Team Samuel*	2230	19	0
20	Team Laurens	2229	17	-3
21	Team Rob	2146	21	0
22	Team Joe	2097	22	0
23	Team Julie	2029	24	1
24	Team Wes	2009	23	-1
25	Team Jonwaine	1981	25	0
26	Team John	1927	26	0
27	Team Sam*	1801	27	0
28	Team Will*	1766	28	0
29	Team JB	1745	29	0
30	Team Sylvia*	1628	32	2
31	Team Liz*	1612	30	-1
32	Team Doug	1608	31	-1
33	Team Kate	735	33	0

 

Complete breakdown of points from stage 14:

 

Name	STAGE RESULTS	PINK JERSEY	PURPLE JERSEY	BLUE JERSEY	WHITE JERSEY	POINTS/CLASS	TOTAL	PREVIOUS	CUM. TOTAL
Team Amalia*	163	38	7	8	5	60	223	2024	2247
Team Ansel*	145	40	12	14	0	66	211	2269	2480
Team Charles*	156	45	12	9	5	71	227	2249	2476
Team Dominic*	161	48	12	9	5	74	235	2184	2419
Team Grace*	149	43	7	14	0	64	213	2090	2303
Team Hugo*	110	34	12	14	0	60	170	2237	2407
Team Josh*	115	34	12	14	0	60	175	2151	2326
Team Liz*	97	28	9	14	0	51	148	1464	1612
Team Sam*	107	30	11	14	0	55	162	1639	1801
Team Samuel*	149	43	14	12	0	69	218	2012	2230
Team Sylvia*	154	35	4	15	0	56	210	1418	1628
Team Tadej*	153	41	12	9	9	71	224	2107	2331
Team Will*	149	43	4	9	0	56	205	1561	1766

 

Complete breakdown of points from stage 14 (including adults):

 

Name	STAGE RESULTS	PINK JERSEY	PURPLE JERSEY	BLUE JERSEY	WHITE JERSEY	POINTS/CLASS	TOTAL	CUM. TOTAL
Team Adam	175	45	7	10	5	69	244	2468
Team Amalia*	163	38	7	8	5	60	223	2247
Team Amelia	110	30	12	14	5	61	171	2300
Team Ansel*	145	40	12	14	0	66	211	2480
Team Charles*	156	45	12	9	5	71	227	2476
Team Chuck	147	42	11	14	5	72	219	2379
Team Corey	179	37	5	15	0	59	238	2234
Team Corsa	184	43	12	10	0	67	251	2461
Team Craig	184	43	12	10	9	76	260	2609
Team Dominic*	161	48	12	9	5	74	235	2419
Team Doug	138	27	11	5	0	45	183	1608
Team Feng	149	43	12	9	0	64	213	2451
Team Grace*	149	43	7	14	0	64	213	2303
Team Hugo*	110	34	12	14	0	60	170	2407
Team JB	162	37	5	8	0	52	214	1745
Team Joe	156	28	12	13	0	55	211	2097
Team John	103	30	14	9	0	53	156	1927
Team Jonwaine	127	34	11	11	0	56	183	1981
Team Josh*	115	34	12	14	0	60	175	2326
Team Julie	142	35	14	12	3	64	206	2029
Team Kari	188	52	12	9	9	82	270	2693
Team Kate	54	15	0	0	0	15	69	735
Team Kent	159	49	12	14	9	84	243	2620
Team Laurens	127	33	12	9	5	59	186	2229
Team Liz*	97	28	9	14	0	51	148	1612
Team Mitchinson	184	43	12	15	0	72	256	2518
Team Rob	130	32	12	9	4	57	187	2146
Team Sam*	107	30	11	14	0	55	162	1801
Team Samuel*	149	43	14	12	0	69	218	2230
Team Sylvia*	154	35	4	15	0	56	210	1628
Team Tadej*	153	41	12	9	9	71	224	2331
Team Wes	106	30	7	14	0	51	157	2009
Team Will*	149	43	4	9	0	56	205	1766

 

¡Viva la Vuelta!

 

-Laurens.