Vuelta a España 2026 - Stage 14

0:00Welcome back to the Lantern Rouge Sarkin Podcast, three cap of stage 14 of the Vuelta Espanya from Cheyenne to Serrida La Pandera. They do a loop and then go around the olive trees. This is where the classical hyenas of course and then they finish after loads of medium mountains and 4000 meters of climbing with the Sierra della Pandera. It's 12k, 7.5%. At the bottom of it is the Muro de Valdepeña de Hyen which is what does Valdepeña mean? I don't know what's the pain. Perhaps I think someone in my livestream chat earlier said the following take Patrick and I think you'll agree. Why is Falldepeña de Hyen not the finish of Classica Hyen? That is a good point, yeah. It would be a banger. That was like a random hill between two climbs. I think because it's not in Hyen. Oh, Valdepeña de Hyen is not in near Hyen so that's why. That's a valid reason if

1:09that's true. So that's like a proper wall, anric and roguish battle there like five years ago. For the climb 12k, 7.5% it is in three parts. We have like a 4k, 7% highway grinder, then a short flat section, then it's a bit steeper in parts in the middle and then we have a 3k or two k, 12% wall levels off a bit, keeps going up and then 1.1 case to go. They go over the other side of the mountain, the road continues and they go this steep narrow descent straight down and then it kicks up again at the finish in the last 300 meters of the right hand turn. It's classic well to finish, so it's brought to you by Saley and the yeah, we thought it was going to be breakaway, particularly. Well, I thought maybe Musk would go for it, but yesterday evening after the podcast, Movasdars said they were just happy to defend today. So that really meant that. Yeah, the castle on the lost Mulberger, the pistol crash, La Brossa band and today, that's three guys

2:12out. They weren't going to go for it. That's fair and to be honest, I was kind of expecting like a full broadcast today. My broadcast started like good 45 minutes hour after the race began, which means I already had a 45-man break. We have the road once I was able to watch and that 45-man breakaway, that's massive. And it actually includes two Movasdars riders. So we kind of said yesterday that satellite riders are not the most important aspect of today's stage. They can still be valuable, but not the most important aspect. The defensive satellite rider theory still works though. If you don't think Astrid won Garcia Piano will get over the second last climb, the look would be in the climb then you can get them over that climb by having them in the breakaway and therefore having seven minutes to lose in the breakaway to the peloton to be able to be useful afterwards and supporters. That's also what happens. 45 men in this breakaway, including three riders from UAE, Almeida, Oliver, Marko, Kriusberg, Nordhagen for Visma, four riders for Pinarello, Chamberlain for the Kaplan, then we've got Schwestert

3:14Bartsing as only teammate in the breakaway. Importantly, Putrago and Bilbao, so Putrago as KOM candidate plus potential stage win my pick for the stage. Then three stages, three riders from Astana, Fortinato Rodriguez, Europeic for the stage and Romelu. So we've got a potential 1v1 Patrick, but also Rodriguez on 11 minutes and 10 seconds. So close in GC relatively top 10 territory, also Climbo Bertand, this breakaway in same position, 11.06 in GC to get away the teammate Marta and so those are two important riders. Then three riders for Quickstep, including Patipantra and Zana, I would say that's important. Yesterday I jokingly said that you should pick up a risio for today's stage. Well, he heard that and took it personally, that he didn't pick him because he was pretty strong today in a four man roster in this breakaway for Burgos. Am I missing any important name so far? Brenner of course, one of four riders for Tudor Procycling. So what else? So say you're right for getting Fatima and a bunch of other riders

4:14in this group, I can't go over every single one of the 45 riders even though I went over most of them, but it stuck relatively together for the first half of the race until we got over the the fight last climb of the day. I was kind of expecting an earlier Fuga, is that fair? It is fair because you got the very smalls, you got the mediums and you got a couple of like climbing trucks here. So you cannot go to this wall at 1700 meters with the very smalls. I mean, the eventual winner isn't part of that group, but when you look at the names in the top 10 or 11, I mean, your apparicia, Fortunato, Nautargan, Bertay, VPP, Sosa, Christian Rodriguez, these are all the average weights 58 kilos. So you and you did try that. They went with Kevin for marker. They anticipated, but I think the guys who would have tried that were not on stage hunting duties. That's the move you see from Castillo. That's the move you see from Royal Garcia Piano.

5:15There is a satellite rider and you think, probably, how can they be useful on 7% with a GC rider? But when the GC rider maybe gets to the last satellite rider, two cases from the top, the satellite rider has to do 1K, 7%, so they have to do four minutes or three minutes at GC rider pace. The GC rider has just done 20 minutes at GC rider pace and they've been just crawling up the mountain. They can physically do that or even pace harder than that to create a gap. So it does make a difference. It did make a difference today, but it was breakaway all the way, you've never stopped playing it perfectly. They just let the gap out. No one came to pull. Yeah. I was, it got to like seven and a half minutes for Bertay and Rodriguez. And I was like, yeah, but who would you expect to pull? Because Omnitazel Bahrain warned pull because Burtragua is trying to get the stage win or they could try and find the fine line there.

6:17Are we talking only, but then the danger is not big enough for me because I'd expect the gap to go down on the final climb. I was like, I was tiptoeing between kind of expecting someone to shop and realizing that the final climb would probably destroy the gap from the breakaway anyway. You know, I think that's what the calculation Bahrain and any else made, you only counted its coups, but Vismid don't care. Like they got Nordhag in the break, so they'd, they'd rather and if anything, the best way of coups getting in the top 10 is by losing the top 10 and then going back in on stage when he, you just do the musical, it's just musical chairs now. He's not going to get into early. Exactly. Eventually like, Cristiano Rodriguez now actually won't be allowed in the breakaway. Now you've taken too much time. He has to now defend from where he is. And Jews can be on the attack. So yeah, it is like that. Yeah, whatever. His musical chairs. Yeah, the marker anticipates. But the first battle of the day was the KOM points. We see Cristiano Rodriguez and Fortunata going for it. They, I think,

7:25Rodriguez blocks Santi out of it. And then we have a proper beef battle, a really vintage battle between the two picks from Benji and I today. Bhutrago and Cristiano Rodriguez, they heard that pick of each of us and they really fought each other today for the rest of the stage. Are we talking about the look of being clung right now or? Yes, the second last, the cat who with the bony's on top. I think Bhutrago expected them to not go for it. Yeah. But there were bonus seconds on top. And I think that's the reason why Betenque San Rodriguez went for it. That's my take. I'm Fortunata still trying to go for this, but he's pretty far out. I don't see it. He's 50 points. The drift. I don't see it anymore. San Rodriguez. Because I think Betenque got four, no, Rodriguez got four seconds. Betett two seconds. I think that's what mattered for them, which is crazy to me because in the grand skill of things, these seconds won't matter at the end of this ground. Doing the sprint, depleting your anaerobic capacity by doing the sprint probably costs you more time on the final

8:27climb than the two seconds you gain. Yes. Like keeping the cohesion. Because then San T like hate road against Chris. But your ride is probably for the bonus seconds. But San T he was he wasn't happy with that. And if you're not happy with your your mobile data coverage while when you're traveling around, maybe you're still traveling in the heat at the moment. One of the strange things about traveling through Europe, especially for maybe Americans, Australians, is that the countries are very small. They got little small countries here, you know, pocket sized countries, some of them. I'm in one now. And you can cross several countries in a few hours without really thinking about it. The world has gone through about five countries in a few stages. And suddenly your phone will stop working all worse. It keeps working. But it becomes considerably more expensive to keep using it. Saley makes that much easier. It's an E SIM service with plans covering more than 200 destinations, including global and regional plans. If your trip takes you

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10:36we hit it up, Benji. Talking about Armenia, not a single Armenian writer in this breakway, battle, but it was a bit split up. I would say over this local bin climb, you still had Vermarker of the front who was the early anticipator from early on in the stage, which was still ahead. Then Steinhauser somehow got separation in the run into the next climb, which is not the final climb. It's the Valdepenia's Dachhien. It's a wall that Patrick did not imagine for once. It was actually there, a proper wall. And there, Steinhauser basically chops up Vermarker into little pieces, launches past him, Vermarker latches back on over the top. And behind there's this really not that big of a gap to the others, but there's still a moment of maybe, maybe 35 seconds, I think, after Valdepenia's Dachhien of the gap from Steinhauser who then drops from Mark, etc. Who then gets joined by Gio Marta, who attacked behind, who's sort of the philosopher is now. Correct. Which like, I don't hate the idea that Gio Marta tries to anticipate

11:42to put pressure on the others to keep pacing so they don't have to do it for better day. Because better day's goal here is not just the stage, just trying to get as much time in GC as possible, which it is working because I think Tutor and Astana might be working in the big group at this point. Well, it's not worked for Rodrigues. Yeah. Correct. And someone did for Tutor as well, don't know which Tutor Rider it was. For Branner. And what happens after this point? Where are we? Eight kilometers to go on the climb? Eight Ks to go. So they've gotten off the highway drag. They turn right onto the proper steep climb with like seven Ks to go or just under. Indeed, and we have guys bridging across to the guys in front Gio Marta's not pulling. I think he actually was kind of cooked. He'd lose them in a 43 and eventual winner. So he, I don't think he was going to win the stage. And maybe he stopped to help birthday. But yeah, we have attacks and really like stalemates, like a lot of stalemate and looking at each other, eventually Marco Brenner starts to bridge across the group crumbles.

12:49We got we try go Brenner, Valentine Poe, Pantra, Zana and Christian Rodriguez. They get across to Apiricio. And then we try go when they get to the steep section. He just starts to grind in the saddle. He attacks. He drops those of VPP, North Hargons coming back with Sfested. And then Brenner drops before he explodes. And then I was like, okay, I was like, Santa's going to ride away with it. But then Brenner just holds him on 20 meters. And he's bigger. He's all these guys are a, a smalls. And Brenner's a medium. And at 2.8 Ks, it really levels off. And at that point when they went, part, it was a banner even there. Brenner just bangs surges back to the wheel of santi and they even start relaying. Bit later, so sir and Christian Rodriguez, they do come back. And we have four in front. North Hargons doesn't make it back. Burtays with him just about. They don't make it back. We have four in front. And I was like, this is looking good for Marco Brenner. I mean, he, if you

13:55watch Tour of Poland, he's very, very explosive, very punchy. This finish is extremely similar to the Tour of Poland finish one by Bob Lemon. Actually, you do a descent into a one a kicker. Right. Except there's a mountain before it. They did actually have a 6K, 6% climb for it. Okay, it's not Seattle on that. It's yeah, there's no exactly Seattle on that. They're slightly different, but he's very punchy to bonus seconds in Poland. But they get out. So sir and and Christian Rodriguez, they got no chance. They got a peak sprint of like 600 watts. It's not happening. They just so search the drops. They can't do it. Santi, you see him click it into a monster gear behind the group, just one boom, boom, boom. And he's like, he's like track standing, goes left. Brenner looks at him. I was like, you should probably cover that. Yeah, it takes his hands off the saddle, out of the, out of the drops. And then starts trying to do his jersey up. Can't do it. And so I better chase him. I was shocked when I said,

15:01with Dragon, go and Brenner was just doing something with his hands. I assume his vest. Yeah, you're right. But there wasn't there wasn't a solid separation going on. Brenner is the one that once he clogs that the gab's there, he jumps to it quickly. He's not like, okay, looking around who else is going to close it because that would have lost him a potential chance of victory here. But Brenner starts cruising behind. And it's, it's not like flat. It's not uphill. It's not down. And it's like rolling at this point. I would say towards the, towards the finish, ready for the dipper. Because there's a dipper after this segment. But Dragon has a gab. Brenner tries to get to the wheel, gets closer, closer, closer, closer. But it died by the time we hit that downhill segment. That's when Brenner is back on the wheel of Butrag. And after that, the downhill, what's left 400 meters? Yes, 400. And then they kick into it with such speed that it's really like 300 meters that you have to punch up towards as a steep right hand. And Brenner gets, he's left on the front. Brenner jumps him from behind, gets into that corner first kicks out of it and wins the stage quite comfortably.

16:02The biggest win of his career. He won the GC of Tour of Poland. He has, he won a stage of copy Bartoli in 24. He extended his contractually into 2030. Earlier this year. But indeed, his post summer form in Poland is really, really good. He's shown like some punchy stuff. If you've been watching closely in, in our dash into, to you this year in, in, in Brooklyn to the Mayan, he was quite punchy. But this is, this is a small races. And he's also not winning there. And Poland indeed, he didn't win a road stage either. And then, yeah, he gets in the break today and takes the biggest win of his career, the best climbing performance of his career. He, yeah, there's just a few, like even in 2024 and Toskana, he climbed pretty well. He must have climbed pretty well. I think he's obviously dealt with the heat well. The real result, I told you so result from him is that he came 15th in the Andora stage, you know, 15th, not that great. But

17:0415th, there's no breakaway. That's pretty good on that stage. So he's in good shape. Yeah, for sure. And like, Brenner to me reminds me of the days where he was, he was the guy next to Quinn Simmons that came to him that same year from the juniors. That was like the, the year for Brenner and Simmons. We were waiting for what's next for both of them. And I think he struggled with back pain, back injuries in his early 20s. I don't remember the exact details to be honest, but it's good to see that he was able to fight back from that. That he's a tutor. This is tutors first, right? First grand tour stage win. I mean, is there first, well, to ever ridden? Oh, yeah, I'd say so. Yeah. They got the thing so too. They got the RCS invites for, because yeah, but now this is the first. I'm getting a stage win after winning Tour de Pallonia. That's both great for him and for the team. I am. It's early in the three year cycle to start thinking about UCI points, but ever UCI point matters as much, just as much in the first year as a loss here.

18:09This is his sixth season professional. Yeah, he turned pro. And a lot of time at picnic. He turned pro to early. That's the thing. He was together with Simmons to writers that year that jumped the group that jumped the queue. That's where I was looking for and went to world to write the age of what 80. Well, now he's a year younger than Simmons. So it's worse. Because of COVID, his second junior year was during COVID. He didn't even have a proper junior full program in 2020. So he got even less racing experience than he went professional. And the talents always been there. And sometimes you've seen it right at the start of seasons. For example, you know, if we want to bring everything back, he did come 17th on Jabal Al-Akhdah in 2022. As a 20, no, when he was 19 years old on the same time as Philippe Ozzama. So every time, every single discussion point we have

19:10on this podcast, every time we talk about any writer, Patrick just scrolls to their PCS to see have they ever performed on any climb in Oman, Saudi tour, or UA tour. That's how this word in this podcast. 19 years old, Tottenham, Ijibala, Aqqah. The talent's been there and it's taken a long time, but now you get to see his winning in big, big races. Grant, Grant will stay. Actually, World Tour won week GC on that note, Patrick. If we take a look at Jabal Al-Akhdah and the other Clams, is there anyone this year that we're going to see in two years on a Velta stage? The thing is, it's a very similar climb to Pandera. So we're looking at Green Mountain. I can tell. He was grissing about 14. I can't tell people who I'm going to sign. Nils Driessen 14 from Pinarello. Martin Chote in that top to a Finley Pickering 20th. Doing well at the Velta. I'm telling you, the Velta is now the Velta crazy wall finish and Green Mountain crossover is like a hunt in the Van diagram is one circle. It's just the same

20:16riders in the break on these stages. I feel like there's more to be seen with Louis Rollan on coffers. He's good here. Wasn't you on our care last year? Diego Pesca, that is also a bit less. Naira Kintana. Superficial. He's more than one box of pure climber. He's not an even so. He's pretty good. He's in for you at the moment. He helped Kintana win a story. Louis. You wanted himself. Okay, maybe not. Luke is saying we needed to draw a line under the Green Mountain. He's sending Green Mountain stage racing, Kainan in America in 2025. I don't know what that is. Anyway, Stekend, Santiago, we try to go bittersweet, but he will. He's never won a stage in the

21:17Velta. I don't think not just Jiro, but he does take a lot of KWM points that will be handy for him. Was Christian Rodriguez. So, so forth. VPP fifth. The T6 North-Hagen seventh. Zana Calzone. Elmeida was looking okay, but not top shape. In terms of GC, we haven't mentioned the GC battle. So, Romero's pacing, hard pace too. Guys are shiomos as yo-yoing. They turn right. Felix Gold attacks after Castrio. Castrio was pacing, but then Peele's off. And then it's just Enri Marziad. Gold attacks. Harder attack than Hague paced. Oh, before that, Juan Felipe Rodriguez goes to the front after Romero's done with Karapas and the wheel, preparing the biggest lead out for an attack I've ever seen. And Karapas does nothing. I was like, what are we doing here? Yeah, he's kind of shocked. That was like, I can't do, I'm not doing a two-minute effort here. I want the pace to stall and I want to do my 30-30s.

22:19Anyway, that to the side, you ride. Tejada went and Hague started pacing for only. Mas was the first one to attack. I'm pretty sure. Oh yeah, he got a good tester. Skjamos are dropped. And it wasn't until 1.3 kilometers to go where Galwant must followed. Roglic and Karapas looked at each other and then Roglic realized, okay, Karapas is not going to take over. So then Roglic started chasing. Galen must and closes it. And then the next time we go back to the GC riders, Raul Garcia Pierna. We forgot Castillo, by the way, but yeah, let's give credit to RGP Patrick. So I don't know what if Roglic got unlucky, I've got to rewatch it, but basically there's a lot of traffic at this moment. They're over the steep section. Roglic was with must and goal. Karapas, it's the four of them. Kus is dropping on the in almost all their pacing back. He's in the middle.

23:19And there's some, there's cars parked on the right. The teen cars on the brake. There's dropped riders from the brake. There's motos everywhere. RGP pulls full with must and the wheel. They get a crazy moto slingshot. Roglic gets out of the draft. Bang is out. Galen. I'm sure he's also suffering. But yeah, the Garcia Pierna pool took another. So he's given must what? A minute lead just by his own legs. I think so. I mean, I'm maybe overseeing it a little bit, but he pulls full gas and it really makes Roglic suffer. And then Gal takes over. He starts attacking. They get to the descent. Gold goes full to the line. They finish on four 12, which is 25 seconds on Roglic and 31 seconds on Karapas. Now with the GCN. What did you mean? What did you mean with lead? Do you mean like he basis for a minute or no, he has contributed one minute to must as one minute GC lead.

24:22So the Gatsch has contributed 40 seconds from pulling on the gravel stage and Garcia Pierna has contributed one minute. I'm not having that. I'm not having that. I think must might not win this well without RGP. I think 24 seconds. Maybe. Because goal would have passed anyway. So yeah, they take a lot of time for goal. It's worth it because Mars. He now has a two minute lead on second, two minutes and six to goal and two minutes 10 to Roglic. Roglic is not taking two minutes on Mars and a TT and the inner TT coming up. Bertay and Rodriguez moving to eighth and ninth, a minute and a half ahead of Kus Kus drops to tenth to harder drops to 11th. And Karapas is sitting in fourth with probably a he's got a minute act of fifth and he's now two minutes off the podium. He's going to need to do something. And yeah, otherwise it all stays put.

25:26Is your strategy if you're a goal? Again, like the last couple of days try moves with the team, etc. Which ended up failing every time because his attack is never good enough for a separation. Or is it what he did today, which is basically sitting and then keeping that bullet to try and follow Mars when he goes and therefore putting time on Roglic so that you can hopefully have enough time by the time trial that you're not getting called by Roglic and finished second in the ground tour, which I'm basically saying I don't believe Philly's Galcon when he should be writing for second. I think I don't see how it must is just better. Yeah. And Roglic, we need we just need like an ultra Roglic performance for him to have a chance to overcome Mars right now. Because Roglic is still ahead of goal in GC. Virtually. Yeah. So the only way Musk and Ludis ground tour is down trial plus stage 20 something crazy happening. Goal has to stay as close as possible to Mars and then hope the mother star satellite strategy. I mean, I have no idea why the Catholic keep letting them

26:32in the break. I don't know. Like, Roglic, he appears as going to be sitting there on stage 20 on the top of the last Puerto del Duque. It'll be sitting on top with 35k to go to pull the hold to send. And there was like, who could have seen this coming? And the logic behind it is simple. The way Musk can be vulnerable is if he's isolated and then why to start attacking him. Yeah, because I got no always has a domestic and there's never isolated. Exactly. They got no climate. So that's the biggest danger. But you got to be close enough. It's still finished with eight and a half case 10%. But yeah, good stage points. Jersey. Vanart is still 70 points ahead of 65 points ahead of Brennan. KOM Sanctis on 69 points now 29 points ahead of Vanart. It's pretty pretty comfortable. I'd say

27:33tomorrow's stage apparently is going to be shortened because of the heat. So, yeah, I don't know what the stage will be. Laporte abandoned. If it's a sprint, maybe the vismaleed arts not going to be as good with no Laporte should won't be as good without Laporte. It depends on where you put the line if it's get shortened at the back. Then maybe the last line's gone. If it gets shortened at the front, then the last line might not be hard enough without the first climb. It feels more sprinty if I had to imagine a portion of the stage going away. Exactly. Yeah, it was previously was currently as it stands. It's two 190 Ks, 3,500 meters elevation gain. It's obviously going to break away. But yeah, we don't know. It's 130 Ks. We take out some climbs. Maybe call for this like how about we get some have another chance. Else we're in to a Britain. We had a long range of track from Tim Wellens that paid off. He goes into the GC lead very, very into entertaining stage

28:35actually. And one bike is ball. One bike was ball. He was in the break and got caught on the last climb and just managed to hang on. Actually, it looked comfortable the way he hold held on. Wellens was cooked by that point. But wellens was not cooked enough to lose enough time. So lose the virtual GC lead. Crazy sticky balls in that stage. And then we had everything starts in the finnish there are ladies classic a point one race and you under for the gravel race tomorrow, which is the point to razz in Brittany as one by Sarah van Dam in pulled the rizek. They sound a little Polish these places in in Brittany, don't they? They look like Polish names. And we have a little m. Pulled the mizek. Yeah, I don't know what to expect from that. Breakaway one with Tamino just ahead of the Pelt on lead by Danny Van Hopple. Okay. That's all. That's all. Racing or tomorrow we have a lot of good racing. So we have a gravel women's racing in Brittany. We

29:39have the last stage of to a Britain men. We got the ZLM and also GP the Italian small classics begin with GP industry in Arte Chinato also known as L'Archiano 197 kilometers long. And we have a good startless always in these races. We've got Lenny Martinez, Greg Warr, Paulus, Tess Fatsion, Johannes, the other Johannes and Scaroni, Greg races. I'll be watching them. Pete Goc. Starless. Better than the world to punchy stages. It is. It's actually true. But we don't have that many punchy stages. We don't have like, for the pinnacle of the high-end, you know? Maybe I got rid of them. They just do mount top finishes and sprints for talk about tomorrow. We didn't pick a rider. Oh, I'll go that out. I'll go Brennan. We got another profile. So yeah. Yeah.

30:39A real blind guess. Thanks for listening as always. We'll see you the recap tomorrow.