Iván Romeo secured his first professional victory racing for Movistar with a solo win on stage 3 at the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana.
The under-23 time trial World Champion made a late-race attack inside the 16km to go and started the final 1.2km climb to the finish with a 27-second advantage on a reduced field, crossing the finish line with the win in Alpuente.
Santiago Buitrago (Bahrain-Victorious) finished second place and João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) taking third place, both at 10 seconds behind the stage winner.
Almeida moved into the overall race lead after securing valuable time bonuses atop the final ascent of the day, El Remedio. He is now two seconds ahead of runner-up Buitrago as the race heads into stage 4 from Oropesa del Mar to Portell de Morellaon Saturday.
How it unfolded
The third day of racing at the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana was a 180km race from Algemesí to Alpuente. The peloton tackled three ascents at Alto de Alcublas, Peñas de Dios and Romedio before an undulating 20km to the finish, where a 1km steep final climb awaited.
An early breakaway of six riders emerged that included Francisco Muñoz (Polti VisitMalta), Matteo Scalco (VF Group-Bardiani CSF-Faizanè), Unai Iribar (Equipo Kern Pharma), Walter Calzoni (Q36.5 Pro Cycling), Filippo Ridolfo (Novo Nordisk) and Jose Juan Prieto (Petrolike).
The break initially pushed their lead to nearly seven minutes, but that was quickly slashed to under four minutes over the first ascent at Alto de Alcublas (4.7km at 5.4%) and toward the second climb at Peñas de Dios (3.7km at 6.3%).
As Bahrain Victorious and Lidl-Trek took the reigns at the front of the peloton, the gap continued to fall to under two minutes as they approached the final main ascent over El Remedio (7.9km at 6.5%).
The breakaway was caught on the lower slopes as UAE Team Emirates-XRD lit up the race on the steeper sections of the ascent, splitting the peloton apart.
Mathias Vacek (Lidl-Trek) started the day in the leader's jersey, two seconds ahead of João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and five and 16 seconds, respectively, ahead of Bahrain Victorious teammates Santiago Buitrago and Pello Bilbao.
However, Vacek was distanced on the climb and lost 50 seconds, slipping out of contention in the overall classification.
Almeida and Buitrago battled over the top of Remedio for the bonus seconds, with the Portuguese rider securing the three bonus seconds and becoming the virtual leader on the road, with Buitrago right on his wheel.
The pair descended five seconds ahead of the reduced field that included other GC contenders like Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), Thymen Arensman and Carlos Rodríguez (Ineos Grenadiers), Jefferson Alveiro Cepeda and Iván Romeo (Movistar) all inside 30 seconds of the overall lead.
The group caught Almeida and Buitrago inside 16km to go, where Romeo was the first to launch an attack and pushed his lead to 15 seconds.
The Spanish rider, who signed with Movistar in 2023, was hunting for his first professional victory after winning a stage at the 2023 Tour de l'Avenir and the under-23 time trial world title last year.
The solo move forced UAE Team Emirates-XRG, Ineos Grenadiers and Bahrain Victorious to lead the chase behind, but the wide-open roads catered to Romeo's time trial strengths, and he continued to push his lead to 23 seconds inside five kilometres from the line.
Romeo hit the final 1.2km climb to the finish line with 27 seconds in hand. Behind, Arensman was the first to attack from the field but then settled back into the group. The pace was fast, but there was not enough road left to catch Romeo, so he crossed the line 10 seconds ahead to secure his first professional victory with Movistar in Alpuente.
Results
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