Favorites stage 6 Vuelta a Espana 2024 | Battle in the battle, but mostly battling over who gets away

Remarkable: we start this stage in a Carrefour supermarket, with organizer Unipublic wanting to highlight the French supermarket chain through the partnership between the two parties. We do this in Jerez de la Frontera, a city in Andalusia, southern Spain. From there, we trek to Yunquera, over 185 hilly kilometers.

The first sixty kilometers are primarily flat, although there are two short, nasty one-kilometer hills at seven percent. That's where the early breakaway might emerge, but we get a long battle to stay with the bunch in stages like this. That could last until the first climb of the day, the Puerto del Boyar. With 14.7 kilometers at 5.5 percent, that's a tough one anyway, the toughest of the day.

After that, there is a sort of intermediate stage, with descending and flat sections, until the intermediate sprint after 119.5 kilometers. That is also the foot of the Puerto del Viento, a 6.6-kilometer climb at 4.3 percent. Should any group have been given a breakaway, the battle may start among themselves.

At the top of that climb, there are still 45 kilometers, of which the first 35 on the Puerto Martinez (3.5 kilometers at 6.3 percent) are mostly descending or flat. At 8.9 kilometers from the finish, we begin the day's final hill, up to Yunquera. The numbers? The length is 8.9 kilometers, at gradient percentages of 3.9 percent. This is somewhat biased by one downhill kilometer and a nearly flat one: for the most part, it goes up at about 5.0 percent.

Climbs
73.4 km: Puerto del Boyar (14.7 km a 5.5%)
130.3 km: Puerto del Viento (6.6 km a 4.3%)
160.0 km: Puerto Martinez (3.5 km a 6.3%)
185.5 km: Yunquera (8.9 km a 3.9%)

Timetable
Start: 12:40 p.m.
Finish: 5:17 p.m.

We've had some scorching days, but it's about to get slightly cooler on Thursday. Instead of 40 degrees Celsius, it will be around 32 degrees Celsius, with a westerly wind. This means the wind will be with us for the most part, except for the final kilometers,

First of all, what does Primoz Roglic want with his red leader's jersey? In theory, it could be another finish that would suit the Slovenian, but he will likely give up his precious jersey to a breakaway rider. His team would thus be spared from controlling breakaway groups for several days.

Then you end up with the men who are a bit closer and thus did well on Pico Villuerca—Andreas Kron of Lotto-Dstny, who skilfully finished 14th there. The Dane is made for stages like Thursdays, and with Victor Campenaerts and Thomas De Gendt, he has a few more experienced riders in his team. Lennert Van Eetvelt, on the other hand, will probably have to rely on other days.

Wout van Aert is someone who could certainly handle this middle mountain stage. The Belgian from Visma | Lease a Bike can usually easily survive a five percent climb and finish it with his fierce sprint. At the same time, competitors such as Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceuninck) and perhaps Corbin Strong (Israel-Premier Tech) usually have a somewhat more challenging time.

Furthermore, we have quite a few men for the transition stages in this Tour of Spain. Think of types we know from the hilly classics like Jhonatan Narváez (INEOS Grenadiers), Victor Lafay (Decathlon AG2R), Quinten Hermans (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Dylan Teuns (Israel-Premier Tech), Mauro Schmid (Jayco AlUla) and Oier Lazkano (Movistar).

We also note climbers such as Patrick Konrad, Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek), Filippo Zana (Jayco AlUla), Jésus Herrada (Cofidis), Lorenzo Rota (Intermarché-Wanty), Pablo Castrillo (Equipo Kern Pharma), Pelayo Sanchez (Movistar) and Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ), who we then pick from a much larger group of strong riders in this edition of Vuelta a Espana.

A long breakaway could also be successful, say in the Thomas De Gendt way. Also, Matthias Vacek (Lidl-Trek), Joshua Tarling (INEOS Grenadiers), and Stefan Küng (Groupama-FDJ) can accumulate a big lead this way.

To conclude, seeing how the GC teams approach this stage will be interesting. For example, does Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe want UAE-Team Emirates men in the front group and vice versa? And are Louis Meintjes and Guillaume Martin, for instance, already taking minutes before we get to the first mountain stages? Many questions, Thursday the answers!

Top favorites:Wout van Aert (Visma | Lease a Bike) and Andreas Kron (Lotto-Dstny)
Outsiders:Jhonatan Narváez (INEOS Grenadiers), Victor Lafay (Decathlon AG2R), Quinten Hermans (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Mauro Schmid (Jayco AlUla) and Oier Lazkano (Movistar)
Long shots: Mathias Vacek (Lidl-Trek), Filippo Zana (Jayco AlUla), Dylan Teuns (Israel-Premier Tech), Lorenzo Rota (Intermarché-Wanty), Pablo Castrillo (Equipo Kern Pharma), Pelayo Sanchez (Movistar), Quentin Pacher (Groupama-FDJ), Primoz Roglic (Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe), Lennert Van Eetvelt (Lotto-Dstny) and Corbin Strong (Israel-Premier Tech)