Nestling on the foot of the Lagos de Covadonga climb there’s an vital pilgrimage website and basilica church, in-built commemoration of the battle fought there in 718 AD that’s considered as the place to begin of the centuries-long army Reconquista [reconquest] of Spain.
Fast ahead to the 2024 Vuelta a España and Primož Roglič is hoping the identical summit end deep within the northerly Picos de Europa mountain chain may also play host on Tuesday to a really completely different sort of reconquista: that of the chief’s purple jersey, misplaced by Roglič on stage 6 to Australian Ben O’Connor and which the Slovenian has been chasing down ever since.
Pre-stage, this state of affairs bears a placing similarity to the scenario earlier than the 2021 Vuelta Covadonga stage. That day, Roglič launched a devastating long-distance breakaway alongside Ineos Egan Bernal some 60 kilometres earlier than the Covadonga summit. Having dispatched Bernal with 7.5 kilometres to go, Roglič soloed to victory and never solely regained the purple jersey he’d ceded to non-GC menace Odd Christian Eiking every week earlier and 1,200 kilometres distant, on the southern facet of Spain: By the time he reached the rainsoaked summit of Covadonga, his reconquista of the Vuelta was all however full and he’d successfully received the race outright.
But if Eiking had held onto the chief’s jersey for much longer than anticipated, simply as O’Connor has completed this time spherical, that’s so far as the similarities go. Unlike the Norwegian 4 years in the past, O’Connor is a recognised GC challenger, and each prediction up to now that Ben O’Connor will irrevocably lose purple – at Sierra Nevada on stage 9, at Ancares on stage 13 and at Cuitu Negru on stage 15 – has proved to be radically inaccurate.
This brings the 2024 Vuelta to stage 16 and its twenty third ascent of Lagos de Covadonga and the place hopes are excessive amidst Roglič followers and his crew that the Slovenian will as soon as once more, as per 2021, ship a knock-out verdict within the general classification.
Should he accomplish that, historical past will surely be on Roglič’s facet by way of taking the ultimate victory. In 5 of the final six events that Covadonga has been tackled by the Vuelta, together with 2021, in fact, the chief of the race at its summit has – in line with the city legend about Covadonga’s skill to definitively determine the Vuelta general – additionally gone on to be the outright winner.
Quite aside from Roglič in 2021, six years in the past, Simon Yates was in purple at Covadonga and went on to triumph general. Furthermore, in 2016, with Nairo Quintana (additionally the stage winner), 2014 with Alberto Contador and 2010 with Vincenzo Nibali, that was additionally the case. The solely exception within the final half dozen ascents was Joaquim Rodriguez in 2012, main the Vuelta at Covadonga however then ambushed in dramatic vogue by Contador at Fuente De just a few days later.
Yet if Roglič sounded cautious about his probabilities of success this week in his relaxation day press confidence, he’s in all probability proper to be, and never solely due to his personal uneven climbing performances up to now within the 2024 race. Like the wild wolves which have famously roamed throughout a lot of the world for hundreds of years, the stage 16 summit end of the Lagos de Covadonga has developed a well-earned status for being a tricky, considerably unpredictable beast to deal with, with a fierce chew if approached too confidently.
That’s as a result of Lagos de Covadonga may need misplaced its unofficial standing as Spain’s hardest climb in 1999 when the much more demanding highway up the close by Angliru was tarmacked after which shortly launched into the Vuelta route. Covadongac definitely lacks the side-of-a-house steepness of the Angliru and it’s well-tarmacked all through and by no means excessively slim, too. But its wildly various gradients nonetheless make the winding ascent to the dual lakes of Enol and Encina at Lagos summit terribly arduous to deal with.
Across its 14 kilometres, there are three actually robust segments. First off is the Mirador de los Canonigos, which comes after three kilometres, and though not likely steep, that is the primary time the highway actually begins to climb, with gradients of 10 per cent. Then there’s the Huesera [which translates somewhat ominously as the bonesetter] the toughest a part of the climb with gradients of round 15 per cent and even 20 per cent, for about 800 metres. That’s roughly midway up.
Finally, there may be the Mirador de la Reina phase. This is sort of equally troublesome because the Huesera, and comes simply earlier than the climb’s ultimate three rollercoaster kilometres of flat and descent, resulting in the final little kick as much as the end.
What makes Covadonga so difficult, then, isn’t a lot its gradients in themselves because the climb’s adjustments in levels of problem. Some segments of the climb rear skywards, others ease again to being just about flat or briefly head downhill. Unlike extra brutally arduous ascents just like the Angliru the place the technique boils right down to hitting as low a gear as potential and praying you’ll rise up it with out cracking, Lagos de Covadonga’s near-constant adjustments of tempo make it very difficult to calculate your effort, even when you recognize the climb effectively.
Yet, though Covadonga has proved impressively correct at offering indicators as to the outright winner previously, the gaps between the favourites haven’t all the time been giant.
On the third week stage of the 2018 Vuelta, for instance, there have been simply 5 seconds between Yates and the slowest of his foremost challengers, Nairo Quintana. In 2016, Quintana’s benefit on Chris Froome, his most severe rival for la roja, was a scant 26 seconds. In 2014, the three prime names of Alejandro Valverde, Froome and Contador have been separated by an equally paltry 12 seconds.
However, the one exception to those minimal gaps was supplied by Roglič himself in 2021, whose profitable margin of 1:35 on his closest pursuer was 9 seconds sooner than the earlier file of 1987, when Lucho Herrera, one among three double winners on the climb, loved a 1:26 benefit on Vicente Belda. So, a lot selection within the time gaps, although, certainly factors to a different of Covadonga’s points of interest. Unlike the Angliru, all however doomed to create a lone breakaway winner it’s so arduous, on the Covadonga all kinds of outcomes are potential – together with, in fact, a time loss towards his rivals for the person who dominated Covadonga so convincingly in 2021.
Lagos de Covadonga’s standing within the Vuelta isn’t just about who wins the race outright, in any case. In 1983, it additionally represented a landmark within the Vuelta’s historical past as an entity. That was as a result of, after years of declining status and steadily weakening monetary assets, that April’s ascent of Lagos de Covadonga was the primary time the Vuelta had its complete final hour broadcast reside on TV, each in Spain and overseas. This vastly widened media publicity is usually seen as the purpose when the Vuelta, having touched backside within the late Nineteen Seventies, started its lengthy climb again as much as the extent of worldwide recognition it enjoys at present.
So whether or not Primož Roglič lastly takes again la roja and units himself up for a record-equalling fourth victory or if Ben O’Connor continues his tenacious defence of the purple jersey or if yet one more state of affairs emerges on Tuesday, identical to Alpe d’Huez in France or the Mortirolo in Italy, Covadonga’s towering significance and status within the Vuelta a España will stay greater than intact. It already issues an excessive amount of to the Vuelta for every other end result to be potential.
Stage 16 info
The Vuelta’s second relaxation day presents solely a short lived respite from the rigours of racing in Asturias, with a really acquainted foe ready for the peloton as they resume. Lagos da Covadonga has turn into one of many holy websites of Spanish biking because it was first included on the Vuelta route again in 1983, and this 12 months marks the twenty third time the ascent has featured.
Marino Lejarreta, Philippa York, Pedro Delgado, Luis Herrera, Oliverio Rincón, Laurent Jalabert, Pavel Tonkov and Thibaut Pinot all function on the star-studded roll of honour. The final rider to inscribe his title right here was Primoz Roglic, who all however sealed his third general victory in 2021 along with his daring long-range raid on the highway to Lagos da Covadonga.
This day out, the particular class finale is preceded by two class 1 ascents. The Mirador del Fito is adopted by the Collada Llomena, which was the scene of Roglic and Egan Bernal’s dramatic escape again in 2021.
The centrepiece of the stage, in fact, is that grand finale to Lagos da Covadonga, which climbs for 12.5km at 6.9%. That common is tempered by a pair of quick descents, however for probably the most half, this climb is a brute, with most gradients of 16%. The rider in purple on the summit has each probability of carrying the jersey to Madrid.