Marianne Vos (Visma-Lease a Bike) won stage 6 of the Vuelta Femenina, beating Mischa Bredewold (SD Worx-Protime) in a photo finish after an uphill sprint. Ally Wollaston (FDJ-Suez) finished third.
The breakaway was caught in the hilly final when Liane Lippert (Movistar) launched an attack 14km from the finish. Vos, red jersey Demi Vollering (FDJ-Suez), and Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime) bridged to Lippert.
When more riders came up from behind, Lippert made another move that was followed by Bredewold and Vos, but they were caught just after the 10km mark. Despite their efforts, Vos and Bredewold still had enough left to dominate the uphill sprint.
"I’m very happy, and exhausted, to be honest. We knew as a team that today was a chance for us, we wanted to go all-in, and we did. In the end it was really close, so I’m happy I could just take it," said Vos after the stage.
"It was a lot of long, straight, open roads with not a lot of wind, but enough wind to make it hard, mostly headwind. It was not ideal for the breakaway, and when a big group went, we had two riders in there with Femke de Vries and Marion Bunel, so for us it was a good situation," Vos described how the stage developed.
Finishing in the bunch, Demi Vollering retains the red leader's jersey with one big GC day remaining.
How it unfolded
The start of the 126.7km stage from Becerril de Campos to Baltanás was very hectic as there were lots of attempts to establish a break, but nobody succeeded in getting away for the first 45km.
Then a big group of 19 riders got a gap, and as most teams were represented with one or even two riders, the escapees slowly built an advantage of over a minute. This group was too large to work well together, though, and with attacks in the breakaway and Movistar, Cofidis, Liv-AlUla-Jayco, and Coop-Repsol taking up the chase, the break of 19 was caught with 45km to go.
Lea-Lin Teutenberg (Lotto) was next to attack, and when Sarah Roy (EF Education-Oatly) and Nicole Steigenga (AG Insurance-Soudal) bridged to her, a new breakaway was established. Nikola Nosková (Cofidis), Andrea Casagranda (BePink-Imatra-Bongioanni), and Andrea Alzate (Eneicat-CM) formed a chase group, with Titia Ryo (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) bridging to them after a while.
30km from the finish, Teutenberg, Roy, and Steigenga were 53 seconds ahead of the four chasers and 1:23 minutes ahead of the peloton. At the intermediate sprint with 22.2km to go, the peloton was 1:29 minutes behind, but the chase group was reeled in soon afterwards. With Visma-Lease a Bike chasing hard in the hilly terrain, the gap to the break was reduced quickly, and they were only 15 seconds ahead when Teutenberg had to let Roy and Steigenga go 14km from the line.
Liane Lippert then launched her attack on a climb, passing the two remaining escapees. Vos, Vollering, and Anna van der Breggen (SD Worx-Protime) bridged to the German puncher, with Marlen Reusser (Movistar) and other riders coming back after a brief chase.
Lippert made another move and took Bredewold and Vos with her. The three riders cooperated well, but they were only a few seconds ahead of the peloton and were caught again with 9.9km to go.
There were no attacks on the last climb before the finish, and after a downhill attack by Cédrine Kerbaol (EF Education-Oatly) was brought back, a reduced peloton got ready for the sprint. Josie Talbot (Liv-AlUla-Jayco) led the peloton onto the last 500 metres before Imogen Wolff (Visma-Lease a Bike) took over, going through the final right-hander first.
Bredewold started her sprint at the 200-metre mark with Vos on her wheel, and Vos drew alongside on the last 100 metres and pipped Bredewold to the line in a photo finish.
Results
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