CYCLING – Team Bahrain Victorious rider Torstein Traeen successfully defended the leader’s jersey yesterday after his first day in red, completing stage seven of La Vuelta a Espana, which took the race from Andorra to Cerler over the most mountainous course of this year’s edition.
The 188-kilometre stage featured over 4,400 metres of elevation gain across four categorised climbs, presenting a challenging test for Bahrain Victorious, tasked with protecting La Roja while also supporting the squad’s other general classification (GC) contenders.
As on the previous day, the stage was shaped by a breakaway that proved decisive.
Juan Ayuso of UAE Team Emirates-XRG launched the first attack on the Port del Canto, later joined by 11 riders.
Bahrain Victorious took responsibility in the peloton, working to keep the gap under control over the Puerto de la Creu de Perves and the Coll de l’Espina, before the decisive final 12km ascent to Cerler – Huesca la Magia.
On the last climb, Ayuso made his winning move with about 10km to go, securing a solo victory ahead of Marco Frigo of IPT and Raul Garcia Perna of Arkaa–B&B Hotels.
The GC group, including Traeen in red, crossed the line two minutes 35 seconds later, ensuring that the Norwegian would keep the leader’s jersey for another day.
Traeen admitted it was a nerve-wracking but emotional experience defending La Roja: “Today’s stage was quite emotional for me because I really felt the pressure after seeing how much work my teammates did to keep me in position to defend the jersey.
“At one point, I was really nervous, because I didn’t feel so good, but on the last climb I managed it well. Jack [Haig] rode super, super good, closing big gaps and big groups.
Finlay [Pickering] was excellent too on the climbs, Santi [Buitrago] helped me a lot, and then obviously Roman [Ermakov], Mathijs [Paasschens] and Nicolo [Buratti] were riding like motorbikes when they came back. I’m really proud to have teammates like these.”
Traeen will start today’s eighth stage still leading the GC with a two-minute 33-second advantage over Jonas Vingegaard of Visma-Lease a Bike.
With the leg designed for the sprinters, the Norwegian climber looks set to defend the red jersey for at least another day.
&uuid=(email))