Remco Evenepoel’s dominance at this Vuelta a España has, for the time being at least, revised everybody’s ambitions downwards. For Primož Roglič, a day without leaking time at Peñas Blancas counted as a minor success, or at least as a sign that his challenge still holds water.
Evenepoel was briefly halted by a crash 64km from the finish of stage 12, but though his kit was torn and his hip bloodied in the incident, there never seemed to be any prospect of the red jersey’s race unravelling in Andalusia.
Even so, Roglič’s Jumbo-Visma squad dictated the tempo in the peloton at the bottom of the 20km haul up Peñas Blancas, with Rohan Dennis performing a lengthy stint of pace-making, largely in the big ring. After Dennis swung off, his compatriot Chris Harper put in two turns of his own, but while their efforts whittled down the red jersey group, Evenepoel and his remaining teammates Ilan Van Wilder and Louis Vervaeke were unmoved.
Roglič, meanwhile, was tucked in a few wheels behind Evenepoel, and he would remain there more or less to the summit. When Evenepoel himself hit the front in the final 2km, Roglič briefly appeared to be distanced, but he calmly made it across. The Slovenian would cross the line in a group containing the maillot rojo, Enric Mas (Movistar) and Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates), 7:39 down on stage winner Richard Carapaz (Ineos).
In the overall standings, Roglič remains second, 2:41 behind Evenepoel and 22 seconds ahead of Mas. Evenepoel’s performances to date mean that Roglič’s hopes are already flickering, but the nine remaining stages and his treasury of experience in this race are keeping the flame alive for now.
“We will see. For sure today I had a good feeling, so hopefully I can improve a bit,” Roglič said before he descended to his team bus after the finish. “We are a bit behind, so we need to catch up. It’s still a long way, but it was actually not bad.”
After Evenepoel’s comprehensive victory in Tuesday’s time trial in Alicante, Roglič maintained his form to be in crescendo but conceded that the Belgian was “on a different level.” Jumbo-Visma directeur sportif Addy Engels suggested that Roglič’s approach in the second week would be to avoid further time losses in the hope of hitting his stride as the race draws closer to Madrid.
Jumbo-Visma’s deployment of Dennis and Harper on Thursday wasn’t a grand offensive of the kind that dramatically propelled Jonas Vingegaard into the yellow…
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