"Little by little we're finding the form we were looking for" - Enric Mas silences some doubters with much improved performance on stage 5 of Tour de Suisse
Cycling
Enric Mas has been far from his best in 2024, leading to some criticism of the Movistar Team leader ahead of the upcoming Tour de France. On the stage 5 summit finish of the Tour de Suisse however, the Spaniard showed a much improved performance.
"I'm not super happy, but little by little we're finding the form we were looking for here," reflected the 29-year-old in a post-stage interview with the Movistar Team's official social media, having crossed the line in 5th behind UAE Team Emirates duo Adam Yates and Joao Almeida, plus Egan Bernal and Matthew Riccitello. "I didn't arrive here super in terms of condition, but we're growing."
Following the drama of the day, Mas has risen in the general classification to 4th and although the 1:49 time gap to race leader Yates may be a bit too far, the former Vuelta a Espana podium finisher is just 38 seconds off adding a Tour de Suisse podium to his palmares.
"I tried to follow Yates' last push and see if I could get a little bit more and go for the stage win, but in the last kilometre, I couldn't keep up with him. That's all," Mas concludes. "We're going day by day, we'll try between now and Sunday to keep making progress and be satisfied with our form so that we can rest next week and face the Tour de France."
Results: Tour de Suisse 2024 stage 5
| 1 | YATES Adam | UAE Team Emirates | 60 | 03:54:37 |
| 2 | ALMEIDA Joao | UAE Team Emirates | 40 | + 05 |
| 3 | BERNAL Egan | INEOS Grenadiers | 30 | + 16 |
| 4 | RICCITELLO Matthew | Israel-Premier Tech | 25 | + 18 |
| 5 | MAS Enric | Movistar Team | 20 | + 22 |
| 6 | ONLEY Oscar | Team dsm-firmenich PostNL | 15 | + 54 |
| 7 | PIDCOCK Tom | INEOS Grenadiers | 10 | + 54 |
| 8 | HIGUITA Sergio | BORA-hansgrohe | 8 | + 01:03 |
| 9 | GALL Felix | Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team | 5 | + 01:13 |
| 10 | UIJTDEBROEKS Cian | Team Visma | Lease a Bike | 2 | + 01:20 |
No podium likely for Mas at TdF that’s for sure. Not with Pogi, Vingo, Evenepoel, Yates x 2, Rodriquez etc.
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- Yes, I get that but it wasn’t exactly a good comparison if you ask me, circumstances and competition were very different. Also crashing whilst staying up front is pretty different from crashing and being left behind.Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- Pidcock was riding at a hard enough pace until the sector where Pogacar made up something like 20 seconds in something like... 20 seconds. Pidcock was quite a bit ahead, and suddenly he wasn't. At that point, clearly he would get caught, so might as well get caught sooner and work together. That's just good cycling. (I think the point is, plenty of people win even after they've come down in a crash - Van der Poel crashed at the worlds and won, anyway, for example).RidesHills08-04-2025
- Great sprint, Ineos set him up at exactly the right time, they protected the corners through the turns, and he did the job he was supposed to do. Nice to see him win again.RidesHills08-04-2025
- When Vingo, Rogla, and Wout were all at the height of their powers, a sight to behold.mobk08-04-2025
- To quote the article: riders from Arkéa - B&B Hotels and a few others seized the moment to launch an attack, increasing the pace as Pogacar was briefly off the bike. Not coolmij08-04-2025
- I don’t think it was a matter of easing up. I think it was a matter of attacking. And MVDP said his team would respect similar situations. Perhaps not on the penultimate climb, but I believe they would. To accelerate is a jerk move.mij08-04-2025
- His basic attitude always has been (and we know age often reinforces inherent values), if I’m going down I’m going to try taking you with me.Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- I know it’s tradition and nice but to make the discussion more interesting, if an Arkea rider had driven up to tell Alpecin or UAE to ease off for Mozzato or Vauquelin having a P, would they have been as gentlemanly?Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- That’s probably about right although if they’d talked it over it would have been in all their interests to work together to chase Pog down because those 4 arriving at the finish in that scenario would have left all 4 with a chance of victory.Mistermaumau08-04-2025
- Exactly, that easily makes for a minute at the front. You don’t see Pog cracking often either (less often than MVDP even) but when he does it’s lights out and over too. This is completely normal and to be expected, at the level of competitiveness all these guys are they only crack once they’ve pushed beyond their manageable limit and there’s no coming back from that. When your rival forces you into the red to keep or catch up, it’s over, in that respect, well done to WVA who seems to be world champion in staying just outside the red for as long as he can.Mistermaumau08-04-2025