Vine and Groves not interested in Vuelta jerseys after Van Aert's withdrawal: "He has always beaten me"

The crash of Wout van Aert was a huge blow for the entire Vuelta a España, as well as for himself and his team, Visma | Lease a Bike, of course. Two men who might theoretically benefit from the Belgian's withdrawal are Jay Vine and Kaden Groves, who now find themselves in the polka dot jersey and green jersey, respectively. Naturally, there was no joy for the pair.

Vine has often been in breakaways during this Vuelta, but when it came to mountain points, he was frequently beaten by Van Aert. Now that he is the King of the Mountains due to his competitor's withdrawal, the Australian from UAE-Team Emirates is not pleased. "This is not the way I wanted to reclaim the jersey. To be honest, he always beat me in the sprints to the top."

Groves, too, was not particularly happy with the green points jersey. The Australian from Alpecin-Deceuninck had managed to beat Van Aert once in a sprint, but still had a significant gap to close in the points classification. "I didn't expect to be wearing this jersey at all. Van Aert was so far ahead and would probably have won it. And he was also leading the mountains classification... I don't know exactly what happened, but his withdrawal is a terrible way to take this jersey."

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Vine sacrifices mountain points to support teammates

For Vine, there was still something to cheer about. His teammate Marc Soler won the stage after Vine set aside his own ambitions for a stage victory to work for Soler and Isaac Del Toro. "I didn't feel good on the first climb, so I worked for the other two. It’s great that Marc won today, and there are still opportunities this week to go for a stage win."