Ion Izagirre (Cofidis) claimed GP Miguel Indurain for the third and final time of his career before retiring at the end of the season.
The Basque rider followed the attack at the start of the final, hilly 29km to go and reached the final climb with two riders: Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek) and Markel Beloki (EF Education-Easypost).
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How it happened
GP Miguel Indurain of 203.9 kilometers started with a five-man trip with Carlos García Pierna and Sinuhé Fernández (Burgos Burpellet BH), Unai Aznar (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Rafael Durães (Efapel), and Louis Ferreira (Ancolor)/Campicar (Ancolor). They quickly gained five minutes on the peloton before a combination of climbing and a strong chase brought them back within a minute when the television cameras came with 65km to go.
As the division began to break thanks to another part of the attack from Fernández, the controversial attack was clear in the field with Carlos Verona (Lidl-Trek), Nicola Conci (XDS Astana), and Domen Novak (UAE Team Emirates-XRG). They tracked down García Pierna but the operation was canceled before it could be fully confirmed.
After being joined by Geoffrey Bouchard (TotalEnergies) and Jokin Murguialday (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Fernández was finally relieved of his breakaway duties at Alto de Lezáun with 50km to go.
While the two leaders were caught, another counter-attack came from the peloton before the summit, driven by Javier Romo (Movistar). He joined Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious), Julien Bernard (Lidl-Trek) and Jardi van der Lee (EC Education-EasyPost). Mattia Gaffuri (Picnic-PostNL), Jesús Herrada (Burgos Burpellet BH), George Bennett (NSN) and Lennert van Eetvelt (Lotto-Intermarché) also fought, for a leading group of ten.
After a short attack by Van Eetvelt and Bennett were pushed back, Tiberi started to move and was joined by Bernard, but the peloton took the chasers 38km to go.
XDS Astana led the chase for the two survivors, holding them for ten seconds. Tiberi left Bernard behind, but both were caught before the start of the final stage with 29km to go.
On the line, Hector Alvarez (Lidl-Trek) took part and was joined by Jakob Omrzel (Bahrain Victorious), Harry Sweeny (EF Education-EasyPost), Igor Arrieta (UAE Team Emirates XRG) and Ion Izagirre (Cofidis).
Quinn Simmons followed in the footsteps of joining the Alvarez team along with four other riders including Bennett and Diego Ulissi (XDS Astana). The other riders fumbled their way through German champion Georg Zimmermann (Lotto-Intermarché), forming a large group that was only 20 seconds behind the chasing group.
The race would always come down to a series of three climbs in the final 15km, and as Movistar and Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe missed the move, they made sure the 12th escaped alongside Tudor and Caja Rural-Seguros RGA.
The catch almost made it to the first lawn, Alto de Erául, but Simmons accelerated again, taking Sweeny and Izagirre. Arrieta and Bennett struggled to break into the front five, ahead of the peloton.
With 1.5km to go, Izagirre attacked and only Simmons could follow. Sweeny came back to help his teammate Markel Beloki try to bridge the leaders while others were caught by the peloton.
Beloki gave an impressive chase and saw off the pair at Alto Demuru with 6.5km to go with the group about 30 seconds behind the 1st group.
The three riders hit the rally together, Simmons in the lead, with only one short but steep climb standing between them and victory.
In the top half, Izagirre sped past Beloki and pulled away, becoming the US champion, too, much to the delight of the Basque fans.
Results
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