Wout van Aert was in his fourth breakaway of the 2024 Vuelta Ciclista a España on Tuesday, adding to his King of the Mountains lead, when he crashed with two other refugees. Although he carried on for a bit, he had to abandon the race. So far van Aert was the only fellow to take a hat trick of stage victories in the 79th edition. Van Aert’s wreck in late-March’s Dwars door Vlaanderen took him out of competition for two months.
Tuesday was the stage ending on the Vuelta’s monster, Lagos de Covadonga. Van Aert’s breakaway group was over six minutes ahead of the peloton, and Visma-Lease a Bike rider had pulled away from Jay Vine in the mountains classification by cresting Cat. 1 climbs and La Collada Llomena first. On the long descent of the latter climb, van Aert crashed with Isaac del Toro and another rider.
Vine takes over the blue polka dot jersey and Kaden Groves assumes the green jersey that van Aert had worn since winning stage 3.
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