Mas pushes Roglic into Hail Mary territory with stunning Vuelta time trial

Now do we believe him? Ever since Enric Mas took possession of the Vuelta a España lead almost two weeks ago, the Jerez de la Frontera time trial stood out as the most obvious obstacle between him and final overall victory in Granada. 

Racing against the clock has never been Mas’ forte and for all his years at the sharp end of Grand Tours, he had no experience of leading one. Add in Primož Roglič’s presence at his shoulder, and it all added up to a potentially lethal cocktail of circumstances, much like Joaquim Rodríguez’s calamitous defence of his maillot rojo in the Peñafiel time trial back in 2010.

Instead, Mas held his form and his nerve to deliver a clutch performance in the 32.1km test. It was, despite his protestations afterwards, the best time trial display of his life and it leaves him holding a healthy buffer of 1:37 over Roglič with three days to go.

The Vuelta isn’t won just yet, but it would take a spectacular unravelling for Mas to lose it from here. Managing that kind of pressure, of course, has been a recurring question for Mas since he won atop the Alto de Aitana on stage 9. He pointedly reminded reporters as much when he took a seat for his post-stage press conference on Thursday.

“The only pressure came simply from the questions you were asking,” Mas said. “As for me, within the team, I didn’t feel any pressure at all. We were all confident that we could pull off a really good ride, and that was that.”

Mas was never likely to lose the jersey here, given that it would have required conceding more than four seconds per kilometre to Roglič, but there was a genuine possibility that he might lose all momentum ahead of the grand finale.

Had Roglič replicated his gains on Mas from the Caen time trial at last year’s Tour de France, for instance, the Slovenian would have finished the day a little over half a minute off the red jersey. That would have planted considerable doubt in Mas’ mind before the back-to-back summit finishes on Friday and Saturday. Squeaky bum time for Mas, as Alex Ferguson would have put it, and game on for Roglič.

Instead, Mas delivered a confident performance on the road to Jerez de la Frontera, limiting his losses on Roglič to just 33 seconds, or 1.02 seconds per kilometre. But while the final result is all that counts in a time trial, it doesn’t tell the full story.

Mas’ time trial was one of three parts, each more impressive than the next. After 11.7km, he was 21.8 seconds down on Roglič, losing ground at an already acceptable rate of 1.86 seconds per kilometre. After 22.1km, he was 36.4 seconds down, improving the overall rate of loss to 1.64 seconds per kilometre. In the final 10km, Mas went further, finishing stronger than Roglič by four seconds on him down the stretch.

“I don’t think it was my best time trial,” Mas said, but it was hard to think of a better one. Indeed, given the stakes, it was hard to think of a better performance of any kind across his entire career. The stars have aligned for Mas on this Vuelta, and on the evidence of the 18 stages to date, it’s hard to see how he can squander a winning hand like this one.

But the Vuelta has a maddening habit of Vuelta-ing when you least expect it. The history of the race is sprinkled with challenges running aground in the most bizarre circumstances in the dying days of the race. The Sierra de Guadarrama near Madrid, in particular, has been something of a Bermuda Triangle for Vuelta leaders over the years, as Philippa York, Tom Dumoulin and more could testify.

The Andalusian coda to this year’s Vuelta at least means that Mas is spared that specific ordeal, but the terrain is still there for willing attackers on the two mountain stages before Sunday’s finale in Granada.

With Felix Gall now at 3:01 and Richard Carapaz now 5:17 down, Mas’ focus will be squarely Roglič on the road to Peñas Blancas and Collado del Alguacil. Roglič already has four Vueltas on his palmarès and second place won’t change his legacy in the slightest. The Red Bull camp intimated on Thursday evening that he would be willing to take risks to take red.

“Now it is up to us to really take the initiative and try to create a situation somewhere,” sports director Sven Vanthourenhout told Sporza. “I don’t think we should tell Primož, ‘Just ride for second place now.’ That is not why he came here and that is not the rider he is. So we definitely want to get the maximum out of it.”

The thought was echoed by his colleague Patxi Vila, even if the Spaniard was slightly more circumspect about the prospects of success against this iteration of Mas. “We will try to win, but of course also just using common sense and having a deep thought about the whole thing,” Vila said. “I think there’s still room, even though it’s hard, but we will try.”

In particular, Red Bull might be tempted to test if Mas went deeper than he needed to go in Jerez, not unlike Simon Yates when he defended the maglia rosa so emphatically in the Rovereto time trial on the 2018 Giro d’Italia. Yates, previously untouchable when the road climbed, would pay a sudden price for those efforts when questions were asked on the Colle delle Finestre.

“Everyone knows that the only way Enric can lose the Vuelta is through an ambush,” Joaquim Rodríguez told Marca on Thursday, thinking, no doubt, of how Alberto Contador snatched the red jersey off his shoulders at Fuente Dé in 2012. A reminder, as if it were needed, that there is more than one way to lose a Vuelta.

Mas has been on another level on summit finishes so far, but he will surely face something more inventive in the days ahead. Roglič and Red Bull are now in Hail Mary territory at the Vuelta after the time trial, and that should only heighten Mas and Movistar’s vigilance for the final days in the mountains.