Out of a messy, disjointed sprint on stage eight of the Vuelta a España emerged names you’d forgotten about (Elia Viviani), ones chasing a maiden Grand Tour stage that will surely one day come (Ethan Vernon), and riders you don’t have to apologise for being unfamiliar with (Arne Marit). That’s the charm of the Vuelta a España: so unfriendly is it to sprinters that it affords opportunities to those otherwise relegated to the smaller races or delegated leadout tasks. Despite their promising positions at the front of the peloton with the road running out, however, none of them were going to win.
Jasper Philipsen, hidden, blocked, having boarded another train to his Alpecin-Deceuninck-piloted one, was going to win. Even when he’s lost control of his first class steam wagon, the Belgian still rises to the top. Even when his legs, for whatever reason, aren’t responding – “my legs were concrete,” he said – he claims another victory. Even when he’s behind in the race for the green jersey and perhaps not even bothered by it, he still marches in and ensures the headlines revolve around him.
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It would be an exaggeration to describe Philipsen’s victory in Zaragoza as one of his greatest – given the competition he was up against it wouldn’t even make it onto the B-side of his greatest hits – but it highlighted another facet of Philipsen’s world-class sprinting: his ability to go alone, to surf the wheels of others, to pick a gap through the mass of bodies in front of him, and then throw his bike across the line, his wheels coasting across the white ticker tape ahead of those of his opponents who were dreaming that he was going to be denied. Stage eight was not to be a repeat of stage four when Ben Turner snuck in and shocked him.
“It was an incredible leadout again,” Philipsen, 27, rightfully said, “but I was not there. I tried to communicate but it was difficult [to do so] in the last kilometre and I had to find a way, take the wind. I just managed to win. The work of the team has not been for nothing. We won, so we cannot complain.”
Philipsen winning his second stage of this Vuelta (Image: Unipublic / Cxcling / Antonio Baixauli)
They absolutely can’t. That’s win number six in Grand Tours for the Belgian team this year, and Philipsen counts three of them: two at the Vuelta, and stage one of the Tour de France. It’s a travesty that the team of the Roodhooft brothers still don’t have a replacement sponsor for Deceuninck for the 2026 season. In the here and now, though, all they can do is keep winning, and for as long as Philipsen remains in the Vuelta, they’ll be confident of doing so.
The big climbs – Angliru, Farrapona and Morredero, to name just three of the most hellish ones – all come in the next week, and if Philipsen decides that he doesn’t want to challenge Mads Pedersen for the points jersey (he's currently 15 points shy of the Dane), then he’s sticking around in the race for opportunities on stages 19 and 21. “Every Grand Tour win is always special, but it’s never easy – you suffer a lot of days in the mountains to get here,” he said. “From now on it’s going to be a tough Vuelta.” It’s a long time to wait until he can be a protagonist again, and an even longer time in the gruppetto, but it’s made bearable by knowing his win tally is likely to be added to. “Two wins already makes it a bit easier,” he smiled.
