Olympic Champion Primoz Roglic wins La Vuelta Opening Time Trial

Primoz Roglic stamps his authority on the race as he looks to win his third straight La Vuelta victory

The opening stage of the Spanish grand tour was a 7.1-kilometre time trial in Burgos.

Ineos-Grenadiers' Dylan van Baarle was first to stay in the hot seat. The Dutchman set a fast time of 8 minutes and 43 seconds, but he was ousted by Alex Aranburu (Astana-Premier Tech), who completed the TT circuit in eight minutes and 38 seconds.

The last rider to start, the leader of Team Jumbo-Visma beat Spain's Alex Aranburu (Astana-Premier Tech) who was in the hot seat by 6 seconds and his compatriot Jan Tratnik (Bahrain Victorious) by 8 seconds.

Most of the other GC contenders finished at least fourteen seconds down on Roglic, with Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) losing 26 seconds to the Slovenian, Enric Mas is 18 seconds behind, Alexander Vlasov 14 seconds and Romain Bardet 17 seconds behind the Olympic champion.

Tomorrow's Stage 2 is a flat stage between Caleruega and Burgos which will suit a breakaway or bunch sprint. Stage 3 on Monday will be the next big test for the GC favorites with a mountain top finish atop the 1,500m high Picón Blanco.

VIDEO: 2021 La Vuelta Stage 1 Final Kilometre

2021 La Vuelta Stage 1 Top 10

1 Primoz Roglic (Slo) Jumbo-Visma 00:08:32
2 Alex Aranburu Deba (Spa) Astana-Premier Tech 00:00:06
3 Jan Tratnik (Slo) Bahrain Victorious 00:00:08
4 Tom Scully (NZl) EF Education-Nippo 00:00:10
5 Josef Cerny (Cze) Deceuninck-QuickStep
6 Dylan van Baarle (Ned) Ineos Grenadiers 00:00:11
7 Andrea Bagioli (Ita) Deceuninck-QuickStep 00:00:12
8 Lawson Craddock (USA) EF Education-Nippo 00:00:13
9 Michael Matthews (Aus) Team BikeExchange 00:00:14
10 Aleksandr Vlasov (Rus) Astana-Premier Tech