Ineos Grenadiers won their first race outside of National Championships since July 2024 on Monday - 226 days ago - winning the Clásica Jaén through Michał Kwiatkowski.
The Pole attacked with 65km to go of the Spanish one-day race in Andalusia, taking Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates XRG) with him, joining the three remaining members of the day's breakaway out front. The leading trio later became just Kwiatkowski, McNulty and Ibon Ruiz of Kern Pharma. After McNulty punctured and Ruiz faded, Kwiatkowski soloed to victory. Ruiz ended up finishing third, with Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates XRG) overtaking him to finish second.
Aside from Egan Bernal's twin victories at the Colombian National Championships it was Ineos Grenadiers' first triumph since stage wins at the Tour of Austria last July. After a tough 2024 which saw them win just 14 times, they have now notched three wins in 2025 by mid-February. It was Kwiatkowski's 32nd victory of his career, but the first since he won stage 13 of the Tour de France in 2023.
It was not just an impressive performance from the former world champion, either, with new signing Axel Laurance and Ben Turner also inside the top 10; Bernal and Ben Swift were ever-present throughout the race as well. It seemed like there were always Ineos riders in the key moves, a good start to the European season, even if this was a 1.1-ranked race. They are still waiting for their first WorldTour win since the Critérium du Dauphiné last year, 253 days ago. Sadly for the team, Bernal crashed late on and was taken to hospital.
"You always have to believe that sort of thing was possible," Kwiatkowski said of his move. "The pace was super hard from the second sector and I didn't expect that that early on. Late on it was a small group, and we had a lot of numbers. Everyone was racing perfectly, we knew we could do it well. I just went in a move with McNulty. I was proud of how we rode today. I want to dedicate this victory to my family, it has been a tough couple of months."
"Last year I had a lower back injury, so I didn't race for a long time. I started racing in Australia, I had pretty good condition, but I was missing something to get the victory. Back here, I had a decent two weeks training, my family stayed at home so I know much sacrifice I have done. It means a lot to me that I'm back on the level of winning the races. If it was not me today, there were other guys on my team that deserved the victory."
