- Gaudu takes home the stage victory
- Fantastic job by the Jumbo Visma team
In the final stage, the peloton ended up divided into several groups at the very start of the Arrabinieta climb at km 3. The first breakaway was engineered by riders Carlos Verona (56, MOV), Jan Polanc (37, UAD), Jakob Fuglsang (2, APT) and Antwan Tolhoek (145, TJV), the latter holding out the longest before being overtaken by the group of favorites.
The first passes saw the first attacks and attempted breakaways, but Roglic in the second group, at 39” from the head of the race, and Tadej Pogacar (31, UAD), accompanied by teammate Brandon McNulty (33, UAD) in the third group at 49”, started to pick up the pace.
It was from then on when McNulty could no longer keep up and began to fall behind, while Roglic managed to position himself as the leader of the race, leaving McNulty more than 3 minutes behind. Meanwhile, Pogacar turned to Mikel Landa (171, TBV) and Alejandro Valverde (56, MOV), among others, for support as he tried to shave off seconds, but the difference of nearly a minute proved to be too much.
Roglic and Gaudu won at Arrate and kept up the pace from then on, crossing the finish line together, which gave the French rider the stage victory and the Slovenian the overall victory at the 2021 Itzulia.
