As it happened: Breakaway takes surprise victory on hectic stage 11

In case you want a recap of today’s racing, check out our race report here:

Vuelta a España: Eddie Dunbar solos to stage 11 victory from breakaway

Ineos Grenadiers’ Carlos Rodríguez finds himself moving into the white jersey today too.

The Spaniard sits six seconds ahead of Lipowitz with 10 stages remaining.

The GC standings are now in, with Carlos Rodríguez being the biggest mover – from ninth to sixth, and just two minutes back from Primož Roglič. 

Enric Mas also leapfrogs Richard Carapaz into third, with the Movistar man on 3:58 now.

As just mentioned, George Bennett has moved into the top-10 too, moving up six places to tenth on 5:46.

After a solid effort in today’s breakaway that has seen him move up the GC standings, George Bennett (Israel-Premier Tech) said:

“It’s so complicated, nobody now is riding for their top 10 but maybe in a few days, guys might start riding to keep the gaps small. So it might be the last few opportunities where we see guys jumping into the top-10 in the next four days.

“I mean I don’t know, what do I know. I’m probably completely wrong!” he chuckled.

Some more quotes from Dunbar:

“It’s been a while since I’ve been in a scenario like this if I’m honest and I just used my experience. I was suffering a bit on the big climb. I just played my cards and said ‘I’d gamble and back my finish.’ 

“It’s incredible I mean, since the Vuelta last year I’ve had 7 or 8 crashes. Physically that takes a toll but mentally it took its toll on me as well. I’ve had numerous times in my head where I might not have a future in this sport just because of the crashes and injuries I’ve had. This year after the Giro when I injured my LCL I thought that could be the nail in the coffin in terms of my cycling career.” 

Here’s the stage standings from today.

Some quotes from today’s stage winner, Eddie Dunbar (Team Jayco AlUla):

“It’s weird how it goes sometimes, I had a really bad start to the race and lost loads of time. I came here to race GC and I realised pretty quickly that I didn’t have the legs to do it. My preparation was really good here so it was a case of reassessing and just going for a stage.

“Today came [about] an opportunity that I didn’t expect as I tried hard to get in the break and I just thought that my legs…