Vuelta a España stage 13: Florian Sénéchal snatches opportunity for win

Florian Sénéchal (Deceuninck-Quick-Step) won the field sprint on stage 13 of the 2021 Vuelta a España on a textbook leadout.

Sénéchal has been one of the lead-out riders for Fabio Jakobsen in previous stages. But when the Dutch rider in the green jersey suffered a flat in the final 2km, the Frenchman took the opportunity to win the stage and deny others points in the green jersey competition.

“We did a perfect lead-out for Fabio [Jakobsen], and he said on the radio he had a flat tire or something, and said ‘Florian you can sprint,’” the stage-winner said. “It’s crazy. I am lucky today and I am very happy for my family, friends, and my wife.”

This was Sénéchal’s first grand tour stage win.

Matteo Trentin (UAE-Team Emirates), active in the sprint on the previous stage, again came up shy of the stage win.

How it happened

Throughout the first 160km of the stage, a breakaway yo-yo’ed off the front with an advantage of between 20 seconds and 2:30.

Frequent tempo changes allowed three Spaniards — Luis Angel Mate (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Diego Rubio (Burgos-BH), and Alvaro Cuadros (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) — time at the front of a relatively flat, windless, and hot stage.

With 60km to go, Cofidis did the work to keep Guillaume Martin, in second overall, safe in a cross-tailwind that kept speeds high.

Splits in the peloton and echelons formed behind Cofidis, with Jumbo-Visma, Deceuninck-Quick-Step, and Movistar throttling the pace.

The gap to the break plummeted to just 20 seconds in a handful of kilometers, but the pace of the chasers again settled, and again allowed the break to stretch their lead to a minute advantage, at 50km to go.

Several times the pursuing pack brought gap under control only to see the break go up the road; a 30 second gap became a minute advantage for several kilometers before becoming just a 30-second margin again.

Finally, the gap to the three on the front was erased at 28km remaining, when James Knox (Deceuninck-Quick-Step) did a turn at the front of the pack before retiring to the back of the bunch for the remainder of the stage.

At 13.5km to go, Jakobsen rolled through the intermediate sprint point uncontested, and further padded his massive lead in the points competition while overall race leader Odd Eiking (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert Matériaux) was brought to the front by his team.

On the other side of the road, Groupama-FDJ escorted their favored sprinter, Arnaud Démare, to near the front shadowed by Jakobsen.

At 6km to go, no single team controlled the front of the race. Ineos Grenadiers escorted Egan Bernal to the pointy end of things, while the “Wolfpack” also rolled on the front — moving at nearly 65kph — for Jakobsen.

Versatility in the “Wolfpack”

After ramping up the speed of the race to prevent other teams from controlling the front, the Deceuninck-Quick-Step “Wolfpack” looked to be on the hunt for Jakobsen until just inside of the 3km safety zone (where any riders suffering a flat, a mechanical, or a crash are awarded the same time as the bunch).

Jakobsen, who had been in a perfect, fourth-wheel position, was no longer in the sprint train, apparently the victim of a flat tire.

The white-and-blue train of Deceuninck-Quick-Step ripped along the final kilometer, and Sénéchal was the last man remaining, with only Trentin on his wheel.

A well-timed bike-stab at the line earned Sénéchal the stage win and 50 points in the green jersey competition, denying others the maximum points available in the sprint classification.

“I did my sprint at full speed. Fortunately, I heard on the [race] radio that I had carte blanche, that Fabio [Jakobsen] was blocked, I don’t know why,” said Sénéchal. “I have an incredible team, who put me on the podium. To them I say a thousand times thank you for what they did for me today.”

Seeing an opportunity to steal a few seconds from his closest GC rivals, Egan Bernal — not usually in the mix in sprint stages — hopped wheels from his Ineos Grenadier teammates to the back of the Deceuninck-Quick-Step, UAE-Team Emirates, and Alpecin-Fenix sprint trains, to ride into 10th place on the stage.

What’s to come

If stage 13 was designed for the sprinters, stage 14, Saturday, is one for the climbers. With 3,200 meters (more than 11,000 feet) of climbing, mostly packed into the final 80 kilometers, this mountain stage is even tougher than it looks.

The final climb to the Pico Villuercas summit is almost 15 kilometers long at over 6 percent, with a 10-percent section in the middle. This is the first time that this mountain has featured in the Vuelta and its first stage winner will almost certainly be a top GC contender.

Primož Roglič will likely look to put time into his rivals and climb the GC standings, while Eiking will most certainly not cede the lead without a fight.