Results Vuelta a Andalucia 2026 | Iván Romeo and Movistar win after massive GC raid; UAE and Pidcock lose over a minute
Cycling
Stage 2 of the Vuelta a Andalucia was another difficult day with some climbs of different difficulty spread throughout the day. Ideal terrain for a GC raid, and that is exactly what happed. Iván Romeo took the win for Movistar and is the new race leader.
The stage began with a relatively flat profile and here a breakaway was formed including Ion Izagirre, dangerous attacks which were reeled in. Eventually Ibai Azanza, Josh Burnett and José Antonio Prieto went up the road, but in the 25-kilometer long Puerto de la Cabra with around 100 kilometers to go, the race exploded.
Chaos began when Iván Romeo and Andreas Leknessund attacked and joined Burnett up front. Shortly after the peloton was seeing the main GC contenders attacking with Tom Pidcock and Tim Wellens on the go; but this was terrain where the gradients weren't high and following wheels was not overly hard - hence, it became a very tactical race.
Romeo and Leknessund went over the climb in front and behind there wasn't a coherent chase. The race calmed down behind and the gap grew to three minutes, a gap that was excessive and that the peloton wouldn't be able to bring in. UAE, Pinarello, Visma, Cofidis and Groupama were all involved in the chase at certain points but the gap would only come down very slightly.
Burnett cracked up front leaving two men alone, whilst the group slowly lost riders in the rolling climbs. Going into the final 5 kilometers the gap was still of over a minute, with everyone seemingly waiting for the slight uphill finale into Otura. Up front it was a matter of who had the most legs, and here it was Spanish national champion Iván Romeo who could drop Leknessund and take a meaningful stage win that also boosts him into the race lead. The Norwegian finished second, 7 second behind.
Behind there were a few attacks in the peloton towards the finale which brought the gap down to less than a minute, but Romeo carries over a minute due to bonifications. It was Alex Aranburu who sprinted to third place behind.
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