Brennan tees up Van Aert while showing Visma the future

Brennan had become the first Grand Tour debutant since Tadej Pogacar on the 2019 Vuelta to notch up a hat-trick of stage victories, delivering imperious sprints at Manosque, Roquetes and Lorca. 

But those triumphs, impressive as they were, simply confirmed what we already knew about Brennan from his sparkling debut season as a pro, when his speed carried him to 12 victories. He has continued in the same vein in 2026, where his running tally has reached ten wins, including Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne.

This Vuelta marks another phase in Brennan’s development, and he keeps clearing every obstacle that has been placed before him. Visma’s decision to bring him, to make him their chief sprinter, and to deploy Van Aert and Christophe Laporte as his lead-out train was a considerable vote of confidence in Brennan’s abilities, but that responsibility also comes with a pressure that not many 21-year-olds are equipped to handle.

Both on and off the bike, Brennan has worn his status lightly, and he has also struck a neat balance between paying due deference to Van Aert’s abilities without ever shrinking away from the fact that he had earned the right to be Visma’s first option on those finales. Winning helps, of course, and winning again and again helps even more.

When Van Aert helped Brennan win his second stage in Roquetes last week, Visma sports director Maarten Wynants insisted that the Belgian would still be assigned opportunities of his own on this Vuelta. But Brennan’s speed, form and growing range meant it wasn’t immediately clear when and where those occasions would arise.

On the face of it, stage 13 to Loja posed a mild conundrum for Visma, with the terrain neither fish nor fowl. Logic said that two weeks into a Grand Tour, the day was ripe for a break to go the distance, but the relatively fast run-in to Loja seemed to lend itself to sprinters and Visma had the fastest on in the race at their disposal.

In the end, a combination of circumstances and Visma’s sheer desire to engineer a stage win for Van Aert won out. When an unwieldy break of some 43 riders formed, Visma had three riders aboard in Van Aert, Brennan and Bruno Armirail. 

Van Aert was obviously the preferred option, even when Brennan got up the road when the group split up. “I knew I had a superstar behind me and the team working at full gas to put him in the best situation possible,” Brennan admitted afterwards.

Even so, the rugged roads allowed Brennan to showcase his growing ease on the climbs, and he caught the eye with his display on the category 2 Puerto de Granada, where there was never any prospect that he would be distanced by his companions. 

Brennan had already demonstrated his range with his performances across his first two seasons, from his GP Denain triumph to his thunderous uphill sprint at the Zakopane ski resort on last year’s Tour de Pologne, but his comfort here, two weeks into his Grand Tour, was something to behold.

Even more impressive was Brennan’s poise over the other side, when Van Aert joined him in the front group of 11 that would fight out the stage honours in Loja. “Me and Matthew in a group like that, we both have a chance but we’re also able to sacrifice it for each other. We kept on attacking and the final attack worked,” Van Aert said.

That’s the gist of it, but it doesn’t tell the full story, as Brennan sacrificed a touch more than Van Aert. He delivered a masterclass in support riding, repeatedly shutting down moves on behalf of Van Aert, constantly checking over his shoulder to keep tabs on his teammate. 

That policing broke the spirit and rhythm of the breakaway group. When Van Aert unleashed his decisive attack with a little under 4km to go, only the indomitable Valentin Paret-Peintre could follow, but the Soudal Quick-Step man was always going to be a spectator in the two-up sprint.

Brennan, meanwhile, sprinted comfortably to third on the stage, 24 seconds down on his teammate, completing a day of celebration for Visma. 

Van Aert remains the beating heart of this team, as testified by the outpouring of joy in the Visma camp as he claimed the spoils, but Brennan demonstrated even more clearly that he is the Belgian’s heir. 

There is a world of difference between a stage of the Vuelta and the rough and tumble of the cobbled Classics, of course, and there will surely be teething problems for Brennan along the way, but his likely trajectory already looks clear.

“He’s such an incredible young kid. The way he races already, I just cannot get my head around that he’s doing like this,” Van Aert said admiringly. “Days like this, big breakaway, 40 degrees… Everybody gets told you need a lot of experience for that, but he’s just pulling it off straight away. You almost don’t have to coach him.” 

Brennan, for his part, displayed a touch of Van Aert’s selflessness by couching his role in his teammate’s triumph as being “sweeter than a win” and he hinted at his own ambition by suggesting this performance had been more valuable than his sprint victories. “Proper racing that, wasn’t it?” he said.

Behind the podium, meanwhile, Van Aert returned the compliment to his young teammate. “His biggest quality is that he also understands that you have to give sometimes, and how he helped me in the final was incredible,” he said. 

Game recognises game.