Rodriguez and Mas torture compatriots and ally Landa: "Very unfortunate for Spanish cycling"

After the eighteenth stage, they had no choice but to listen carefully to Carlos Rodriguez and Enric Mas to hear two compatriots who would rather not have abandoned Mikkel Landa. The Spaniard of Soudal-Quick Step had a bad day Thursday, and Rodriguez's INEOS Grenadiers took advantage of that. Landa lost more than three minutes and can forget about the Vuelta podium.

The time loss was quite a surprise, as the 18th stage in the Tour of Spain was not classified beforehand as an essential day for the classification riders. However, an attack by EF Education-EasyPost and Richard Carapaz caused war anyway. 'We knew the Puerto de Herrera was a tough climb, and there could be an attack. We were ready for that," Rodriguez said of it. In his red jersey, Ben O'Connor had still stated that he had not seen the attack coming.

Overall, Landa was the victim of Carapaz's attacking tendencies, and the gap opened quickly. Jhonatan Narváez dropped back from the leading group to set the pace for white jersey wearer Rodriguez, who bought his compatriot some extra time. "When Landa dropped out, finding each other in the group was easy. Mikel is a great competitor; putting him behind will be good for us if we can put him behind. No one knows what will happen now. Mikel was one of the best climbers in this Vuelta and has been suddenly eliminated. Anything is possible in the third week with the challenging days ahead."

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Mas sympathizes with ally Landa

Mas, of course, also saw the time gain on Landa as something positive. However, the number three ranking rider also sympathized with the man with whom he gets along well in the race. Mas (Movistar) and Landa even said that they wanted to help each other in the hunt for Primoz Roglic, but it doesn't seem to be coming to that. "He must have had a bad moment, but Mikel never gives up. It's unfortunate for Spanish cycling."

Mas did not get into trouble himself and thus remains fully in the race for the podium. "Let's hope I'm not the next to be eliminated on Friday. Carapaz's attack didn't upset me, but it had consequences, so I'm satisfied with that."