Jesus Herrada wins Vuelta Stage 6, Dylan Teuns into race lead as several contenders crash out

Cofidis rider Jesus Herrada whose brother and team-mate Jose was in the break at the Vuelta yesterday but was beaten into third place has family bragging rights tonight after taking the Stage 6 victory at Ares del Maestrat.

Dylan Teuns of Bahrain Merida takes the overall lead following a day when four riders abandoned the race following a big crash midway through the stage - EF Education First's Rigoberto Uran and Hugh Carthy, former race leader Team Sunweb's Nicolas Roche, and CCC's Victor de la Parte.

Herrada attacked inside the closing 200 metres to distance Teuns, while AG2R-La Mondiale’s Dorian Godon took third place from Jumbo-Visma’s Robert Gesink at the end of the 198.9-kilometre stage from Mora de Rubielos.

Meanwhile, Team Ineos rider David de la Cruz, also in the break, finished ninth and moves second overall, 38 seconds behind Teuns.

Following the exit from the race of Uran and Carthy, there was further bad news for EF Education First late on in the stage when Tejay van Garderen crashed on the descent of the penultimate climb, landing in a bush, although the American managed to make it to the finish.

Bora-Hansgrohe’s Sam Bennett keeps the green points jersey while yesterday’s stage winner, Angel Madrazo of Burgos-BH, remains in the lead of the mountains competition.

Overnight leader Miguel Angel Lopez of Astana, meanwhile, drops to third overall and swaps the red jersey of overall leader for the white one of best young rider for tomorrow’s Stage 7, which features the third successive summit finish of the race.

EF Education First team doctor Rick Morgan

Hugh has broken his left collarbone and will need surgery to repair it. Rigo has also broken his left collarbone, just past the plate that was placed on the bone from the break he suffered in March [at Paris-Nice]. He has also broken his shoulder blade in several places.

Team CEO Jonathan Vaughters 

This has really not been a great day for the team. Now the most important thing is that we focus on making sure Rigo and Hugh and the rest of the team are healthy. And we refocus the guys still racing on other objectives.

Stage winner Jesus Herrada

There is no vengeance, only new opportunities. I was targeting this stage because I know the start and the final climb pretty well. This victory is for my brother, who came close to taking the victory yesterday. It’s also for my family and my partner, who came to the stage; and for the team, obviously. It was hard to get the break going. Halfway through the stage, we didn’t know if we were gonna make it. When Teuns accelerated, I stuck to his wheel and I saved energy for the sprint. And I got the win.

Race leader Dylan Teuns

I already had the red jersey on my mind before I came to La Vuelta. Today I raced for the stage and in the final climb I went all in with 4km to go. It would have been nicer to also win the stage but I’m happy with La Roja.

I was unlucky that one guy was strong enough to follow me, and then I didn’t have the legs to sprint in the last 300m. We have to see how I can defend the jersey. Tomorrow we have a pretty hard and steep final climb. I saw yesterday the GC riders are really strong.