2021 Vuelta a España Stage 18 Results & Recap
Stage 18 of the 2021 Vuelta a España is in the books. The final results and standings are below, followed by our recap of how the race unfolded.
Race Recap
López
Miguel Ángel López (Movistar Team) won stage 18 of the Vuelta a Espana today in a solo charge to the summit of Altu d’El Gamoniteiru.
“I wanted to win again in La Vuelta for a long time and I have achieved it thanks to the magnificent work of my teammates, despite the fact that there are only five of us after the loss of Carlos [Verona], Alejandro [Valverde] and [Johan] Jacobs," Lopez said. "Thanks to Imanol [Erviti], Nelson [Oliveira], Rojilla [Jose Joaquin Rojas] and Enric [Mas], who have done a great job. We knew it was nice to prevail at a stage like today. It had been four years since I won at La Vuelta and it’s even better in the queen stage, I do it with love and desire for my son as well. I think this victory means a lot for Movistar because of the great work of all the team, only those of us who are there know the suffering day by day, it is not only talking and criticising. Today we gave a nice show and we go away with this nice victory. We are now calm, we knew it was an important day and we had to take advantage of it.”
The Colombian attacked the final climb and held off a charging Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) who also attacked and put more time into his nearest rival, Enric Mas and Lopez.
“It felt like a queen stage, it was really hard, especially after yesterday’s effort, it was extremely hard for me and I’m happy that I had something left to climb this mountain," Roglic said. "We were off duty [with Bahrain Victorious and Movistar Team pulling the peloton]. In my opinion, we could have gone easier! It was a hard pace and a hard day from start to finish. I’m happy we’re done with the big mountains. We’re all feeling the efforts from the last two days and the three weeks before. Still, there are hard stages to come. Hopefully, we can do our best and finish it off.”\n
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