Movistar magic as Iván Romeo wins stage 2 of the Vuelta a Andalucia

Iván Romeo (Movistar) won stage 2 of the Vuelta a Andalucía after succeeding from the day’s breakaway, with the peloton split into groups across the roads throughout the stage. With the field scattered, the breakaway was able to maintain a significant advantage, allowing Andreas Leknessund (Uno-X Mobility) and Iván Romeo to go clear as cohesion faltered behind.

Romeo made his move for victory just before the kilometre to go marker and pushed on, dropping Leknessund, who fought valiantly to secure second place on the stage.

The group of favourites behind will be asking how there was such a lack of cohesion, as Romeo now holds a 54 second advantage in the standings with the remaining stage parcours well within range of the young Spaniard.

The decisive move was made on the opening climb of the stage, Puerto de la Cabra, 25.1 km at 4.6 percent, where the breakaway pressed on ahead of a group of favourites that included Tom Pidcock (Q36.5-Pinarello) and Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), who attempted to bridge across to no avail. Leknessund and Romeo took advantage of a lull in the chase behind, and as the chase regrouped Visma | Lease a Bike returned to group 2, which contained the then race leader Christophe Laporte. That shift meant the majority of teams halted their chase.

The main rider working behind Leknessund and Romeo was the defending champion Pavel Sivakov (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), who could not make a dent into the two ahead until the final kilometres.

The Vuelta a Andalucía continues with stage 3 on Friday, which features numerous climbs dotted throughout the parcours and should entice the daring attackers.