Stage 9

The road

At the start

Les Praeres, and the steepest ramps yet

Back-to-back summit finishes in Asturias, and the second is the harder: Les Praeres, where Simon Yates took the red jersey for good in 2018, ramping into double figures on a road barely wide enough for a car. Remco Evenepoel still leads, 28 seconds up on Enric Mas and 1:01 on Primož Roglič, with Carlos Rodríguez fourth. Six riders did not start yesterday. The rest day comes after this.

How it was won

1. 179 km to go

   Stannard and Janssens clean up

   It took forty kilometres for ten men to get clear. Over the Mirador del Fito the same two riders sweep another sixteen points between them, the peloton crossing 4:45 back after attacks from Vine, Soler and Buitrago briefly tore it apart.

2. 254 km to go

   Crashes on the twisting descent

   The points go to the break again, but the story is behind: multiple crashes on the way down, with Lutsenko and Fred Wright among those hitting the deck. The GC men thread through the carnage untouched.

3. 324 km to go

   The last calm

   Stannard and Janssens lead over the penultimate climb with the peloton four minutes back. Off the fourth descent of the day, the attacking finally begins in earnest.

4. 412 km to go

   Janssens forces the issue

   With just over twelve kilometres left the Belgian pushes clear, is hauled back, and simply goes again — this time with Battistella — while the rest of the break dithers.

5. 53 km to go

   The red jersey rides everyone off his wheel

   Under the three-kilometre banner on the brutal double-digit ramps of Les Praeres, Evenepoel goes alone and dispatches his rivals with something close to contempt. Forty seconds into Ayuso, Mas and Rodríguez, more into Roglič — a 22-year-old riding a Grand Tour like it belongs to him already.

6. 6At the line

   Meintjes takes his first

   Two minutes up the road the pure climber has caught and passed Janssens and Battistella and ridden clear for a first career Grand Tour stage. Behind him Evenepoel gains another thirty-four seconds on his nearest rival heading into the rest day.

The result