Breakaway beats peloton as Peter Sagan narrowly denied stage win
Jelle Wallays (Lotto Soudal) and Sven Eryk Bytrom avoid getthing caught just before the finish line after being in the break all day
After battling over the climbs of the past two weeks, there were still plenty of sprinters in contention in the race. There hadn’t been a bunch sprint since stage 10, and you could be certain that the faster riders weren’t going to allow this stage to go to the breakaway.
Regardless of this, the escape came, but only three riders were brave enough to challenge the might of the sprinters; Jelle Wallays (Lotto Soudal), Sven Eryk Bytrom (UAE Team Emirates) and Jetse Bol (Burgos-BH). The small breakaway extended their lead to 2m 30s, but they were made to feel that they were always at the peloton’s mercy, the gap barely changing as the day went on and the bunch never appearing to be troubled by the trio up the road.
Coming into the final 10km, the gap dropped from 1m 30s to less than a minute in just a couple of kilometres, but it wasn’t until the race hit the streets of Lleida that the peloton realised they might not make it – the remaining two riders Jelle Wallays (Lotto Soudal) and Sven Eryk Bytrom (UAE Team Emirates) maintaining the slimmest advantage as they passed under the Flamme Rouge for the final kilometre!
With the sprinters in the peloton not reacting to the threat in front of them, Peter Sagan took matters into his own hands and surged ahead, leaving the bunch behind. Just making contact with the second-placed rider as they crossed the line, the UCI World Champion had to settle for third, knowing that if the finish were only a few metres further up the road, the win would have been his.
Jelle Wallays (Lotto Soudal) won the stage with breakaway companion Sven Eryk Bytrom (UAE Team Emirates) second and Peter Sagan third.
Simon Yates finished in the bunch and retained the overall lead with just two mountain summit finish stages to go before heading to Madrid.
The race is still wide open with Alejandro Valverde, Enric Mas, Miguel Angel Lopez and Steven Kruijswijk all within 2 minutes of Yates over lead.
Yates will need to defend every attack from his rivals on the next two stages, which could prove very difficult.
VIDEO: 2018 La Vuelta Stage 18 Highlights by GCN
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2018 La Vuelta Stage 18 Top 10
1 Jelle Wallays (Bel) Lotto Soudal 3:57:03
2 Sven Erik Bystrøm (Nor) UAE Team Emirates
3 Peter Sagan (Svk) Bora-Hansgrohe
4 Elia Viviani (Ita) Quick-Step Floors
5 Ivan Garcia (Spa) Bahrain-Merida
6 Danny van Poppel (Ned) LottoNL-Jumbo
7 Jon Aberasturi Izaga (Spa) Euskadi Basque Country-Murias
8 Tom Van Asbroeck (Bel) EF Education First-Drapac p/b Cannondale
9 Giacomo Nizzolo (Ita) Trek-Segafredo
10 Ryan Gibbons (RSA) Dimension Data
2018 La Vuelta Stage 18 Top 10
1 Simon Yates (GBr) Mitchelton-Scott 73:02:37
2 Alejandro Valverde (Spa) Movistar Team 0:00:25
3 Enric Mas (Spa) Quick-Step Floors 0:01:22
4 Miguel Angel Lopez (Col) Astana Pro Team 0:01:36
5 Steven Kruijswijk (Ned) LottoNL-Jumbo 0:01:48
6 Nairo Quintana (Col) Movistar Team 0:02:11
7 Ion Izagirre (Spa) Bahrain-Merida 0:04:09
8 Rigoberto Uran (Col) EF Education First-Drapac p/b Cannondale 0:04:36
9 Thibaut Pinot (Fra) Groupama-FDJ 0:05:31
10 Tony Gallopin (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale 0:06:05