26/03/2023

Primoz Roglic resists attacks and wins Volta a Catalunya as Remco Evenepoel wins final stage

The Volta a Catalunya had a very tight battle for the overall classification from start to finish. Remco Evenepoel won stage 7 of the race but it was Primoz Roglic who brought home the overall classification after resisting the many attacks of the Belgian.

In a stage that has often seen a breakaway succeed over the last few years, many riders had their intentions on the final day of the race. The escapee group consisted of Carlos Verona, Guillaume Martin, Mikel Bizkarra, Geoffrey Bouchard, Richard Carapaz, Ethan Hayter, David de la Cruz, Simon Carr and Tsgabu Grmay. A strong group, but one that was never given much of a lead.

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In fact it was never larger than two minutes as Soudal - Quick-Step looked to control the race. They had their eyes on the stage win and bonifications and because of that a breakaway had no opportunity to succeed. Entering the final circuit in Barcelona the gap was already less than a minute and the pace only accelerated from there on.

David De la Cruz was the last rider to stand out, only being caught with 28 kilometers to go, on climb 3 out of 6. Until then Quick-Step had used all of their men to make the race hard, and Remco Evenepoel launched his attack on the Montjuic. He was followed by Primoz Roglic only, and Marc Soler connected with the duo shortly after. The trio kept working together, being the strongest of the day, whilst the chase relied mostly on BORA - hansgrohe.

On the penultimate lap Evenepoel put on another stinging attack in the Montjuic and tried to drop the rest, but Roglic continued to follow the attacks. The two entered the final lap alone and with almost a minute of gap over the peloton.

The two could not be split however and it came down to the downhill sprint, where Roglic did not have a problem in leading the pace, and Remco Evenepoel took the stage win. Marc Soler survived to keep his third place on the road, but it was his teammate João Almeida who confirmed his third place in the final podium.