Sepp Kuss may not, at least not yet, be up to tackling Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) on the climbs of Volta a Catalunya. But the race’s second straight Pyrenean summit finish on Wednesday saw the Visma-Lease a Bike star take on a far more active, and ultimately more profitable role, in the stage's final mountain battle.
Following a mid-climb attack on Port Ainé by Mikel Landa (Soudal-QuickStep) and the race leader’s devastating counter-move, Kuss made a searing charge across to Landa and the two began working hard to limit Pogačar’s solo bid for glory.
The last time Landa and Kuss had worked together on a mountain climb was when the Basque rider and North American powered through the mists of the Angliru in the 2023 Vuelta a España, chasing down Kuss’ teammates Jonas Vingegaard and Primož Roglič in defense of Kuss overall lead.
This time around, in very different circumstances, Kuss finally dropped back to finish fifth in a group of three chasers behind Pogačar and Landa, moving to seventh overall. No gain on GC is ever to be sneezed at, of course.
Perhaps more importantly, Kuss showed on Wednesday that he had more in the tank right now than his steady but otherwise unremarkable ride to 12th on stage 2 at Vallter 2000, 24 hours earlier, would have suggested.
“I’m doing well, we tried to make the stage hard, and finally we have to be satisfied with our performance,” Kuss said, referring to how Visma-Lease a Bike had stepped up the pace on the interminably-long second ascent of the day, the 25-kilometre Port del Canto, before he moved into action himself at Port Ainé.
“I was not well-placed when Landa attacked, and I tried to close the gap, but Pogačar had already gone," Kuss said. “We tried to work together, but there was a strong headwind and it wasn’t that easy.”
Now just 70 seconds behind second-placed Landa overall, although Pogačar is all but out of reach, Kuss remained optimistic about his chances of building on GC.
That’s particularly true given stage 6’s ride through the mountains of central Catalunya is such a tough climbing day, much of which takes place on roads the Andorra-based rider knows like the back of his hand from training in the area.
“On Saturday anything could still happen,” he predicted. “I’m still hoping for a top five, maybe even having a try at the podium. We’ll go on racing in the way we do and see what happens.”
Kuss explained that the strategy on the Cantó had been to whittle down the opposition, “because there are a lot of guys who’d be fresher in the end".
"For us, it was better to do a good pace and see what could happen on the climb. It was nice to try and show ourselves, it was fun to race. I’m very pleased with how it worked out. It went much better than yesterday, I felt a lot better and we have to be pleased with the team too. Hopefully, tomorrow [Thursday] will be an easier day, though and we can rest up a bit.
“It’s going to be very difficult to go for that,” he said when asked if Pogačar was still beatable. “We have to try to follow him but without blowing up.
"I’m still looking forward to Saturday, though, and things could still happen on Sunday’s grand finale.”
