Primoz Roglic has secured his fourth consecutive Vuelta a España title, equalling the record held by Roberto Heras, who won the event four times from 2000 to 2005. The Slovenian cyclist successfully navigated the final individual time trial stage to clinch the victory.
Roglic, 34, entered stage 21—a 26.4km time trial—with a lead of two minutes and two seconds over Ben O’Connor from Decathlon-AG2R-La Mondiale. He finished second in the time trial, confirming his overall win. Roglic clocked a stage time of 26 minutes and 59 seconds and completed the race with an overall time of 81 hours, 49 minutes, and 18 seconds.
“I had to go for it or it is even harder so I pushed,” Roglic stated. “At the end it was hard. We [me and my team] all sacrifice, we all live for it. I feel happy I could do it and I appreciate it.”
In the final stage, Switzerland’s Stefan Kung won with a time of 26:28, while Italian Mattia Cattaneo placed third with 26:70. Kung, marking his first Grand Tour stage victory, commented, “It’s always nice if you win with more than half a minute, it shows you were absolutely the best, there was no coincidence today. It’s really nice. It finally repays all the work we do as a team. I always try to be professional and to get the maximum out of myself. It feels good.”
The general classification standings saw only one change with Danish rider Mattias Skjelmose moving into fifth place following an impressive eighth-place finish in the final stage. Consequently, France’s David Gaudu finished in sixth place overall.
