The opening stage of the Vuelta a España, a 7.1km time trial in Burgos, won't prove decisive in the course of this Vuelta a España but nevertheless opened up some potentially significant gaps between the overall hopefuls.
Primoz Roglic (Jumbo-Visma), the Olympic time trial champion and winner of the last two editions of the Vuelta, got off to a storming start, winning the stage and pulling on the first red jersey.
The rider considered his closest challenger, Giro d'Italia champion Egan Bernal, suffered an early blow as he conceded 27 seconds on a course that packed a punchy climb, descent, and flat section into the short distance.
Bernal lines up as one of a number of potential candidates for Ineos Grenadiers and it was early starter Adam Yates who fared the best of them, conceding 20 seconds to Roglic. Richard Carapaz, runner-up at last year's Vuelta and third at this year's Tour, conceded 25 seconds, while Pavel Sivakov - much more of an outsider for leadership - lost 22 seconds.
It was a fairly substantial loss to Roglic over such a short distance but the Slovenian took a decent chunk out of all of his rivals.
Aleksandr Vlaskov (Astana-PremierTech) suffered the least damage, placing 10th on the stage at 14 seconds. Romain Bardet (Team DSM), who has thrown away so much time against the clock over the years, produced perhaps the best time trial of his career to finish 14th and lose just 17 seconds to Roglic.
Enric Mas recovered from a near-slip on an uphill switchback to limit his losses to 17 seconds, while his Movistar co-leader Miguel Angel Lopez finished a further four seconds down.
Clement Champoussin (AG2R Citroën) finished 20 seconds down and could emerge as a GC contender, while Damiano Caruso (Bahrain Victorious), second overall at the Giro, lost 21 seconds. However, the Italian is expected to work for Mikel Landa here, who was late to the ramp, only clipped in two seconds before his start, and finished 39 seconds in arrears of Roglic.
David De la Cruz (UAE Team Emirates) conceded 24 seconds, while Giulio Ciccone (Trek-Segafredo) lost 27 seconds. There was disappointment for last year's podium finisher Hugh Carthy (EF-Nippo), who conceded 33 seconds. It was the same for Guillaume Martin (Cofidis) but Carthy would have hoped for more after a strong TT en route to that podium last year.
Several outsiders for a top 10 finished further back, with Fabio Aru (Qhubeka-NextHash) at 37 seconds, Louis Meintjes (Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert) at 39 seconds, Lucas Hamilton (BikeExchange) at 43 seconds, and James Knox (Deceuninck-QuickStep) at 50 seconds.
