David Gaudu outsprinting Mads Pedersen and Jonas Vingegaard to victory on stage 3 of the Vuelta a España was a weird enough sight on its own, but the diminutive Frenchman mixing it with the fast men on stage 4 in search of bonus seconds on the final bunch sprint was an even more of a rarity.
But when you consider that his first overall lead at a Grand Tour and the Vuelta’s red jersey was on the line, it was a risk worth taking for Gaudu, whose valiant ride amid the shoulders and elbows of a bunch earned him enough of a positional gain after the first four stages to overtake Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike).
“For sure, [going for red] was in my mind this morning, but I don’t really know if I fight for position in the bunch sprint because it is very, very dangerous. But with the feeling I had at the finish, I just went for it. The team did an incredible job. I just disconnected my body and went full to the finish – incredible.”
It was also special for Gaudu, who missed his home Tour de France this season after a lacklustre Giro d’Italia appearance, as the fourth stage of the Vuelta finished in his native France, and he was unable to hide his wide grin…
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