Mathias Vacek sprinted to an excellent second place at the Vuelta a España on Friday. The Czech rider from Lidl-Trek cleverly mastered a tricky climb in the finale, but ran into the stronger Wout van Aert in the sprint. For Bahrain Victorious, Antonio Tiberi regained control of the youth classification after a disappointing day for Florian Lipowitz.
Vacek finished second, with the same result as in the opening time trial. The Lidl-Trek rider was determined to survive the Alto del 14% in the final, he told Eurosport after crossing the finish line. “The climb was tough, but I wanted to survive; I gave it my all. I knew that if I got over it with the first ones, I could sprint with a small group.”
Nevertheless, Vacek ran into difficulties on the last kilometer of the climb. “I had to give up just before the summit, but at the end of the descent we came back. I then needed a moment to catch my breath. Then Mathias Skjelmose put me in the perfect position on Van Aert’s rear wheel. I started the sprint a little earlier because I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to win on his rear wheel.”
“Second place behind a rider like Van Aert is nice. I’m happy,” continued Vacek, who is now doing his first grand tour. “I’ve been preparing for this for months and I want to do my best. So far it’s going very well and I’m very happy with it. We’re only in the first week, there are still many stages ahead of us.”
Tiberi: “I saw that Lipowitz had problems”
Tiberi stood on the podium in the white jersey after the stage. He had not immediately expected that the Italian would be wearing the jersey around his shoulders again so soon after losing it to Lipowitz (Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe) on Thursday. “I’m happy, of course. I didn’t expect to be wearing the white jersey again today,” he said in an interview with the organization. “I saw that Lipowitz was having problems on the climb and thought he might have to give up in the last kilometer, because that’s the hardest part,” Tiberi said, secretly holding out some hope in the final phase. Lipowitz finally crossed the finish line in the second group, seventeen seconds behind. The young German had been in the leading group the day before, from where Ben O’Connor took a solo double victory.
The leader of Bahrain Victorious, who hopes to finish on the final podium, initially hoped for Saturday’s stage to regain the white jersey. In fact, the eighth stage ends with an irregular climb of about five kilometers. “But having it today is very good and I’m going to enjoy it.” Tiberi can count on some competition in the fight for the junior jersey. For example, five riders are within a minute of him. However, Tiberi is particularly looking at the preliminary revelation of this Vuelta a España. “Lennert Van Eetvelt also wants the white jersey and he is very strong. It’s only three seconds, but the Vuelta is also very long, with many mountains ahead. So we’ll see.”
