Wout van Aert took his second win at the 2024 Vuelta a Espana on stage 7 after a chaotic and frantic finale. Cool, calm and collected amongst the chaos however, Sepp Kuss was arguably the key factor in his teammate's victory.
"We always had this stage in mind for Wout, but we knew it would be hard, especially with the pace on the last climb," the American, defending Vuelta a Espana champion told the assembled press following the stage 7 finale. "But when we saw he was still there, I knew he was on a good day, so I tried to keep things together."
When Marc Soler attacked late on, Van Aert's chances of victory looked to be riding away up the road. Despite his own general classification ambitions however, Kuss took to the front of the diminished chase group and like a one man army, drilled an incredible pace and reeled back the ride-away Spaniard.
"It was a suffer-fest to pull Soler back, but it feels like a victory for me too, it was really nice to be there with Wout," Kuss concludes his assessment delightedly. "In such small groups, there are always going to be attacks. But Wout is cool and sharp enough to know which ones to follow."
🇪🇸 #LaVuelta24 𝐓𝐄𝐀𝐌 VISMA | LEASE A BIKE! 💯 What a display of teamwork by Wout, Sepp, Edoardo, Robert, Steven, Attila and Cian! 🔥 It’s what Team Visma | Lease a Bike is all about. Look out for each other in life, grant each other something & become stronger together! ❤️
