La Vuelta Ciclista a España 2025 Stage 7

August 29, 2025 The riders roll out of Andorra La Vella with a 30KM neutral zone and re-enter Spain for what is, on paper, the hardest stage of the race. There are four categorized climbs that add up to over 4,200M of elevation by the time they reach the finish in Cerler atop Huesca La Magia. The first climb of Port del Cantó starts after just 10KM of racing and is nearly 25KM long at 4.5% with sections of 5KM that are over 8%. The proper descent ends in Sort where the riders turn South to La Pobla de Segur all on false flat downhill roads. The climbing resumes with Port de la Creu de Perves and the Coll de L'Espina, each around 6% average grade for 6KM and 7KM respectively. After the descent into Castejón de Sos with 29KM to go, the rest of the stage is uphill. The valley drags from Castejón de Sos to Benasque where the final climb to Huesca La Magia begins. In all, the climb is 12.1KM long at 6% but it goes up in long stretches consistently at 8% before dropping down to the next ramp. Today will be a slow burn that could end with a fizzle or bang. The weather cooperated today with beautiful blue sky for perfect racing conditions. A headwind down the valley from Andorra La Vella made the break difficult to get established. Three riders arrived at the foot of the Port del Cantó including Gal Glivar of Alpecin-Deceuninck, Jonas Gregaard of Lotto, and Pierre Thierry of Arkéa-B&B Hotels but attacks started flying behind. The three leaders were caught as Juan Ayuso of UAE-XRG went on the attack with the peloton still bubbling with activity. Raúl García Pierna of Arkéa-B&B Hotels was stuck in the middle between the bunch and Ayuso for a long time until 4KM to the top when a group came up to him but the bunch was there and closed it down. Ayuso went over the top first at 150KM to go with Mads Pedersen of Lidl-Trek at 15 seconds just in front of a group of eleven with the peloton a further 10 seconds behind. The groups consolidated on the descent and the break formed with Pedersen, García Pierna, Ayuso and teammate Jay Vine, Sean Quinn of EF-Education EasyPost, Damien Howson of Q36.5, Harold Tejada of XDS-Astana, Brieuc Rolland of Groupama-FDJ, Joel Nicolau of Caja Rural-Seguros RGA, Kevin Vermaerke of Picnic-PostNL, Eduardo Sepúlveda of Lotto, and Marco Frigo of Israel-Premier Tech. Bahrain Victorious led the peloton in hopes of keeping the Red Jersey with Torstein Træen for another day. The best placed in the group was García Pierna who started the day nearly 5 minutes down on Træen so it was a reasonable goal for the team. Through La Pobla de Segur with 100KM to go, the gap had stabilized at around 4 minutes. The race continued for next 20KM until Nicolau attacked the break to grab Mountains points on top of the Port de la Creu de Perves. Vine was straight on the wheel along with Quinn but it was Vine, current leader of the classification, who took maximum points with Nicolau in second and Quinn in third. The break arrived at the Coll de L'Espina with 53KM to go still with 4 minutes 10 seconds. Once again, the battle for Mountains points shook up the break. Vine went early this time with 1KM to climb and comfortably took maximum points with Quinn and Frigo in second and third a few moments later. Quinn wanted to push on but neither Vine or Frigo were interested in riding and they were brought back into the main break. Mathijs Paasschens continued to set the pace for Bahrain Victorious all the way to 35KM to go at the start of the descent into Castejón de Sos when other GC teams moved forward for better positioning. In the break, Pedersen did longer pulls on the approach to the intermediate sprint in Benasque and took the 20 points uncontested to add to his tally and keep the Green Jersey for another day. The gap was still holding at 3 minutes 40 seconds which would likely be enough for the break to go for the stage for the second day in a row. Nicolau and Pedersen were the first dropped from the break as Vine went to the front to set a pace for Ayuso. Only about 1KM later, Ayuso attacked and only Frigo could follow. Frigo took a few pulls with Ayuso but the Spaniard didn't want company and attacked again, this time getting a good gap. Frigo was joined by García Pierna with 7.5KM to go but they were already 30 seconds behind. With 2.5KM to go, García Pierna was dropped by Frigo but the Italian was now 1 minute 15 seconds down on Ayuso and could only hope to hold on to his second place. Ayuso soloed to the line and took top honors on the day, the third straight stage win for UAE-XRG, after being aggressive right from the beginning. Frigo took second place, 1 minute 14 seconds down with García Pierna in third. In the peloton, Visma-Lease a Bike road hard into the bottom of the Huesca La Magia and cut the peloton down to 30 riders quite quickly. UAE-XRG went to the front with 6KM to climb and put on an even quicker pace. When Marc Soler pulled off with 5.5KM to go, João Almeida attacked and only Jonas Vingegaard of Visma-Lease a Bike and Giulio Ciccone of Lidl-Trek could follow. Egan Bernal of Ineos and Sepp Kuss of Visma-Lease a Bike made their way back on and shortly after, the group swelled to 15 riders. Visma-Lease a Bike kept control of the group for the rest of the climb and the favorites finished together around 2 minutes 30 seconds after Ayuso. Torstein Træen finished in the GC group and retains the overall lead. Vingegaard moved up to second at 2 minutes 33 seconds with Almeida now in third at 2 minutes 41 seconds. Træen's teammate and team leader, Antonio Tiberi, finished nearly 15 minutes down and is now completely out of the GC hunt.