Marc Soler claimed his fourth career Vuelta a España stage win with a powerful solo ride to La Farrapona, while Jonas Vingegaard strengthened his grip on the red jersey after outsprinting João Almeida for second place.
The 136km stage from Avilés to La Farrapona was one of the most demanding of this year’s race, with more than 4,000 metres of climbing packed into a relatively short distance. The start was delayed briefly due to a pro-Palestinian protest directed at Israel Premier Tech, whose riders began the day wearing altered kits with the team name removed. Once underway, the peloton quickly faced a fierce pace heading into the Asturian mountains.
How the stage unfolded
A large breakaway formed early, including Victor Campenaerts, who initially looked strong but decided to sit up on the first major ascent to conserve energy for the coming days. The escape group established a lead approaching six minutes, which proved decisive for the outcome.
On the decisive final climb of La Farrapona, Soler pressed on alone with 16km to go. He later admitted that his presence in the break had been accidental, originally intended to act as support should Almeida launch an attack from behind. But as the race unfolded and Almeida stayed with the GC favourites, Soler was free to commit fully. Drawing on his painful experience of losing here in 2020 to David Gaudu, he managed his effort carefully, taking advantage of the headwind and the disorganisation in the chase to build and hold his gap to the summit.
Behind him, UAE had already put riders such as Mikkel Bjerg and Felix Großschartner to work on the previous Alto de San Llaurienzu, but on La Farrapona their plan to launch Almeida fizzled out in the wind. In the peloton, the pace remained high with Visma | Lease a Bike and Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe also contributing, but no serious attacks were made until the final kilometre.
Vingegaard rode calmly throughout, shadowing moves and waiting for the sprint. When the road tipped up in the closing metres, he accelerated to take second place on the stage, narrowly beating Almeida. The Dane added six valuable bonus seconds to his lead, stretching the gap to 48 seconds at the top of the general classification.
Further back, Tom Pidcock limited his losses despite conceding time to Jai Hindley, who attacked in the closing kilometre but couldn’t gain bonus seconds. Pidcock crossed the line in eighth, showing resilience after a second consecutive tough day in the high mountains and retaining his podium position by 32 seconds over the Australian.
Reactions
“I never expected it, and it wasn’t my intention to be in the break,” Soler said. “But when Campenaerts bridged across, I followed, and from then on I just kept pushing. Originally the idea was to work for João, but the circumstances worked out differently. This is a really special win for me, especially here at La Farrapona where I lost in 2020. It’s also a nice present for my wife.”
Vingegaard was satisfied with his effort. “Because of the headwind, it was hard to make a difference. I can be happy with the bonus seconds I didn’t expect. We didn’t want to play it for the stage win after the work the team did yesterday, but overall, I’m satisfied with where we are.”
Almeida explained why he held back. “We had nothing to lose by having Marc up the road. The wind made it difficult to launch a move, so in the end it was about holding position. The fight for red continues next week.”
Pidcock accepted his narrow time loss with optimism. “I lost a bit more time, but I think I’m getting better and better at these longer efforts. This is something I’ve been working on, and I can see the improvement. There’s still a lot to fight for in the last week.”
2025 Vuelta a Espana Stage 14 result
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Main photo credit: Getty
