Vuelta a Burgos 2023 – Stage 3 [FULL STAGE]

August 17, 2023

Vuelta a Burgos 2023 🇪🇸 – Stage 3 – Sargentes da la Lora – Villarcayo : 183 km

Falling just before the Vuelta a España, this five-day stage race often serves as the ideal warm up event for those riders eyeing up a top result at the Spanish Grand Tour. With most of the Vuelta’s GC favourites on the startline, it’s also a great chance for onlookers to gauge each rider’s form and see who’s hot, and who’s not. This year, the race will host Primož Roglič’s return to racing ahead of the Vuelta. The format of the race has stayed largely the same since its inception in 1946, with each edition featuring five gruelling stages in and around the mountainous Burgos province of northern Spain. Over the past few years the race has typically started with a rolling stage around the city of Burgos, the capital city of the eponymously named province. The race has then tended to head north to the mountains that straddle the Burgos-Cantabria border for a mid-race summit finish, often on top of the monstrously steep Picón Blanco – an 8.5km-long climb with an average gradient of 9% and several ramps teetering on 20%. The organisers don’t just stop there with the climbing, after shuffling the GC on the Picón Blanco halfway through the race the organisers then throw in the classic summit finish to Lagunas de Neila on the final day to draw everything to a close. This particular climb has played host to the finale of the Vuelta a Burgos every year since 2015. At 11km in length, with an average gradient of 6% and ramps of 17% in the final 4km, it’s clear to see why the GC is often decided on this mountain.

Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) moved into the overall lead of the Vuelta a Burgos after he won stage 3 in a four-up sprint in Villarcayo. Aleksandr Vlasov (Bora-Hansgrohe) took second place ahead of Adam Yates (UAE Team Emirates) and Damien Howson (Q36.5).

The winning move took shape over the demanding climb of Picón Blanco, where Yates’ UAE Team Emirates squad took up the pace-making and succeeded in isolating Roglič from his Jumbo-Visma teammates, but the Slovenian looked as unflappable as ever despite their efforts.

Jumbo-Visma had taken up the reins at the head of the bunch at the base of the climb in defence of Roglič and overnight leader Attila Valter, but the yellow and black jerseys soon melted away from the front of the race as UAE Team Emirates dictated the terms.

At one point on the upper reaches of the climb, Roglič had only the UAE trio of Yates, Jay Vine and George Bennett for company, but he never appeared unduly troubled by their forcing on the ascent.

Behind, the race had fragmented into shards, with Vlasov, Howson and Einer Rubio (Movistar) the most dogged of the riders trying to stay on terms with Yates, Roglič et al.

Only Roglič and Howson could follow when Yates accelerated near the summit with 35km to race, and they were later joined on the long descent by Vlasov. Vine had also been chasing back on in the company of Vlasov, but the Australian’s hopes were ended by a crash on the descent.

Although Vine remounted and joined another chasing group with Bennett, Rubio and Javier Romo (Astana-Qazaqstan), the Australian eventually had to relent in the finale.

Out in front, Yates won the bonus sprint with 9km to go ahead of Vlasov and Roglič as they built an advantage of more than a minute over their pursuers. The short climb of the Alto de Bocos with 7km offered itself as a springboard for late attacks, but the gradient was perhaps not quite steep enough to break up the front group, and Roglič was more than content to control the pace from the front and bide his time for a four-man sprint.

When the quartet reached the finishing straight, Yates opened his effort from distance, but Roglič calmly hunted him down to claim his 10th win of the season and lay down another marker ahead of the Vuelta a España, where he will be flanked by Jonas Vingegaard as he chases his fourth overall victory.

“You never really know how it finishes,” Roglič said of his win here. “There was already a lot of work done when I was with the best ones on the climb, but you have to finish it off. It was a hot day, hard, but our team did a great job from the start by controlling it. It was fun, I’m very happy about it.”

While the hors categorie Picón Blanco – scene of Rein Taaramae’s win on the 2021 Vuelta a España – was the centrepiece of the stage, the series of category 3 climbs early in the day offered scope for the breakaway.

Matteo Fabbro, Lennard Kämna (Bora-Hansgrohe), Jaakko Hänninen, Larry Warbasse (AG2R Citroën), Jesús Ezquerra (Burgos-BH), Raúl García Pierna (Kern Pharma), Xabier Berasategi (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Mattia Bais (Eolo-Kometa) and Filippo Conca (Q36.5) duly forged clear, but Jumbo-Visma’s chasing meant they hit the base of Picón Blanco with less than a minute in hand on the bunch.

García Pierna proved the strongest of the escapees on the day’s key climb, but he was pinned back the select leading group once UAE had begun to turn the screw. By then, the purple jersey Valter and Roglič’s key lieutenant Jan Tratnik had been distanced, and the numerical advantage lay with UAE.

Roglič, however, held firm on the climb and then picked up the stage victory to put himself in a commanding position atop the overall standings, 34 seconds clear of Vlasov and 40 ahead of Yates. Howson, Rubio and Bennett are the only other riders with two minutes of his lead with two days remaining.

The Slovenian has a 100% record in stage races so far this year, winning Tirreno-Adriatico, the Volta a Catalunya and the Giro d’Italia. He looks destined to add the Vuelta a Burgos to that list, even if Roglič was as understated as ever after the podium ceremony. “Day by day, eh,” he smiled.

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