"We were not the favorites and we have won" - UAE celebrate triumph over Visma in Figueres

UAE Team Emirates XRG won the team time.trial of the 2025 Vuelta a Espana. The victory, in addition to improving the overall time of Juan Ayuso and João Almeida, the team has managed to gather a lot of motivation and beat Team Visma | Lease a Bike on a day that was important going into the mountains in this race.

"The truth is that a victory in a team time trial is always important, it means team, technological progress, legs and team concept," Joxean Matxín, team manager, said after the race. The Spaniard acknowledged that the start was not easy: "The warm-up did not start well and we had to do another lap. That push to be more competitive has helped us to win and not leave anything to chance".

Against a Visma of 7 and with men such as Jay Vine and Mikkel Bjerg pushing the pace alongside the two main GC cards, the team was able to cover the 24 kilometers at an average speed of over 56Km/h. They were cover the course 8 seconds quicker than Visma, which sees the duo now closing the gap to a total of also 8 seconds to Jonas Vingegaard who is back in the race lead. "We are going day by day, we were not the favorites and we have won. We're going to enjoy today," concluded Matxín, underlining the satisfaction of starting the Spanish round in the best possible way.

UAE entered the finish line 8 seconds ahead of Visma, 9 seconds ahead of Lidl-Trek, 12 seconds ahead of BORA and 16 seconds ahead of INEOS. They made a very balanced time trial with many men until the end. Together with Ayuso and Almeida, Marc Soler and Mikkel Bjerg entered the finish line in Figueres together. The satisfaction of the cyclists and the workers of the Emirati squad was enormous after knowing the victory at the finish line.