"Vingegaard didn't seem to be doing too well, but neither did I" - João Almeida justifies Morredero stalemate

The 2025 Vuelta a Espana is coming to a close and the opportunities are running out for João Almeida to take time on Jonas Vingegaard. The Alto de El Morredero today, closing off stage 17, was a good opportunity but the Portuguese didn't have the legs - and he argues neither did the leader of Visma.

The television even captured the two Red Jersey contenders chatting during the decisive kilometers of the climb. Neither the Dane tried to wear down his rival, nor did the Portuguese show the energy to attack, even getting dropped after the first attack of Jai Hindley. In the end, the two arrived two seconds apart at the finish line, favouring Vingegaard, but a few seconds behind their rivals.

Everything is therefore open for the individual time trial in Valladolid, where João Almeida will start 50 seconds behind Vingegaard. It will be there that the Portuguese rider from UAE Team Emirates - XRG will try to turn the classification around and dream of the final victory in Madrid.

After the stage, Almeida explained how he felt at Morredero: "I'm not disappointed with what happened, I'm tired like everyone else. There's one less day to Madrid."

The Portuguese rider also detailed how the wind conditioned the moves: "The climb was very hard in the first part and in the second part there was a lot of wind, so nobody wanted to attack. In the end, we almost all got to the finish line together and some did a better sprint than others."

As for Jai Hindley's attack, which dropped the UAE rider, he commented: "I knew they wouldn't be able to keep up the strong pace they had set and I set my own pace. I knew I'd come back. The climb was very hard. After the start and after a while we were alone. But that wasn't going to change anything. Vingegaard didn't seem to be doing very well and neither did I. We were more or less equal".

Hence with no differences being made in the mountain stages, the decision of the red jersey may come down to the time-trial tomorrow in Valladolid, but Almeida doesn't know which way the scale will point towards. "I don't have a magic ball, I don't know. The past doesn't give us any guarantees, we have to have strong legs tomorrow."