Ben O’Connor ‘much better than yesterday’ and keeps lead intact in Vuelta a España

One image probably summed up Ben O’Connor’s stoic defence of his Vuelta a España lead on its hardest mountain stage to date – the moment when the Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale leader blasted across the finish line in Granada to claim third on the day, and four bonus seconds into the bargain.

The minimal time regained by O’Connor in Granada will almost certainly be irrelevant come the finish in Madrid in two weeks’ time. But on a day when for some,  but not all, race observers thought his loss of the red jersey had been all but taken for granted, to be able to get the upper hand on his rivals, albeit briefly, must have felt like the icing on an already tasty cake.