Stage 3 of the UAE Tour benefitted an early attacker, as Einer Rubio braved to attack the race early and took a very strong stage win as the GC riders stayed conservative.
A calmer day in terms of weather, the breakaway opportunists could finally enjoy an opportunity. Oier Lazkano (Movistar Team), Baptiste Planckaert (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Filippo Magli and Riccardo Lucca (Green Project-Bardiani CSF-Faizanè) launched themselves in the break of the day.
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Lazkano went solo ahead of the first ascents of the day that were to lead up to Jebel Jais. The day was calm in the peloton until then, with UAE Team Emirates sparking occasional accelerations in the peloton, with the final survivor of Movistar resisting until 11 kilometers to go.
The Spanish team quickly made another move however with Torres launching Einer Rubio. Alone it looked to be a harmless attack as the smooth gradients favoured the group riding behind, but the action calmed and allowed the gap to grow to almost a minute.
The gap began coming down in the final kilometers, but as the leaders ran out of domestique, no rider took the risk and a sprint was inevitable. Einer Rubio stormed to the stage win. Remco Evenepoel rode into the race lead as he sprinted to second whilst Adam Yates rode to third in a big GC group.
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👶🙌 𝙀𝙇 𝙀𝙎𝙏𝙍𝙀𝙉𝙊 𝘿𝙀 '𝙋𝙄𝘾𝘾𝙊𝙇𝙄𝙉𝙊' 🙌👶 🇨🇴 @Einerrubio1 logra nuestra primera victoria WorldTour de 2023 y abre su casillero en 'pros' con una espléndida ascensión a Jebel Jais, etapa 3 🇦🇪 #UAETour 🥇 7️⃣ // 👨 6️⃣ #RodamosJuntos | @Telefonica | @PtelefonicaCol
