2023 Vuelta a Espana: Stage 5 Results

Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceucninck) takes his second sprint win in Stage 5 of the 2023 Vuelta a Espana, besting Filippo Ganna of the Ineos Grenadiers squad by a tire width.

After the first bunch gallop in Tarragona, sprinters were eyeing another opportunity today in Burriana, but they’ll have to overcome the Cat. 2 Collado de Ibola first.

Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step) retained La Roja and still leads with a gap of 5’’ to Enric Mas (Movistar) and 11’’ to Lenny Martinez (Groupama-FDJ). Evenepoel also leads the best young rider standings, 11’’ ahead of Lenny Martinez (Groupama-FDJ), who will thus race with the white jersey today. Cian Uijtdebroeks (Bora-Hansgrohe) is 3rd (+33’’).

Bryan Coquard (Cofidis), Kobe Goossens (Intermarché-Circus-Wanty) and Ruben Guerreiro (Movistar) finished yesterday’s stage after being involved in a crash but they’re unable to resume racing.

After 3 attacks, Eric Fagundez (Burgos-BH) got to 9” ahead of the bunch at km 16 and opened the gap to 2’09” by km 20.

It should be no surprise that Fagundez was in the break today. Before the stage, he told reporters, “I would like to prove myself more and play a better part. I’m to get confidence in myself, getting to know these Grand Tours and seeing what the future holds. I’m still learning [what type of rider I am] as well. Today I want to be in the breakaway, the team’s objective is to have a presence and I want to try to be there.”

60km into the stage, the peloton trailed Fagundez by 5’20”.

With 80km remaining, the gap was steady at around 3 minutes.

As Fagundez started the ascent of Collado de Ibola, his lead had dropped to 2 minutes.

With 48km remaining, Eduardo Sepulveda attacked the peloton and overhauled Fagundez to take over the lead. Fagundez was now 38″ back but still 33″ ahead of the peloton.

With 41km to go, Fagundez was caught by the peloton, and Sepulveda was taken over 3 km later. Several teams were positioning their leaders towards the front of the bunch: Alpecin-Deceuninck, UAE Team Emirates, Jumbo-Visma, Groupama-FDJ.

Into the last 15km, the peloton will soon pass the intermediate sprint and then battle for the win in Burriana. The wind blows moderately from the sea, so it’s a headwind until the final straight, where it will be a crosswind from the left.

Remco Evenepoel takes the intermediate sprint over Kaden Groves, and into the last kilometers, it’s Soudal Quick-Step driving the bunch for Evenepoel.

3km left and several riders went down, including Lotto Dstny’s sprinter Milan Menten.

The last kilometer came down to a battle between Kaden Groves and Filippo Ganna, with Groves edging the Italian by a tire width.

Stage 5 Brief Results:

1. Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceucninck)
2. Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers)
3. Dries Van Gestel (Total Energies)
4. Alberto Dainese (DSM-Firmenich)
5. Lewis Askey (Groupama-FDJ)

General Classification After Stage 5:

1. Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step) @ 17h 12’29”
2. Enric Mas (Movistar Team) @ 11″
3. Lenny Martinez (Groupama – FDJ) @ 17″
4. Jonas Vingegaard (Jumbo- Visma) @ 37″
5. aleksandr vlasov (BORA – hansgrohe) @ 39″

Evenepoel Increases His Advantage

Remco Evenepoel concluded safely in the bunch today, but before leaving the fast men to take center stage, the red jersey had other plans, and with the help of Casper Pedersen – who provided a perfect lead-out – he won the intermediate sprint in Nules, racking up six bonus seconds which helped him extend his buffer in the general classification to eleven seconds. It was a move that caught the opponents of the 23-year-old off-guard.

“I know that these seconds won’t probably make any difference at the end of the race, but as the speed went up, I said to myself I should just go for the bonifications, especially as it didn’t cost me any energy. So far, the race was perfect for us and we hope it will continue like this”, said only the third Belgian to amass 19 leader’s jerseys at the Spanish Grand Tour.