Kuss wins sixth stage of Spanish Vuelta. Evenepoel loses overall lead to Martinez

OBSERVATORIO ASTROFISICO DE JAVALAMBRE, Spain — American rider Sepp Kuss won the mountainous sixth stage of the Spanish Vuelta on Thursday, while Lenny Martinez finished second to wrest the overall lead from defending champion Remco Evenepoel.

Three-time Vuelta winner Primoz Roglic and Tour de France champion Jonas Vingegaard also gained time on Evenepoel, who tumbled down the overall standings to ninth overall. He's now only five seconds ahead of Vinegaard and 11 seconds in front of Roglic, perhaps his two biggest rivals for the title.

Martinez will wear the red leader's jersey with an eight-second gap to Kuss after the 183.5-kilometer (114-mile) ride from La Vall d’Uixó to a summit finish at the Astrophysical Observatory of Javalambre.

“I had in my head at the start of the race that I could take the red jersey, and it was today,” said the 20-year-old Martinez, who rides for Groupama-FDJ.

Kuss pulled away from a breakaway group to win the demanding climb by 26 seconds ahead of Martinez.

Evenepoel was unable to respond to an attack by Roglic and Vingegaard on the final climb, but he did manage to recover his legs over the final kilometers to limit the damage.

“I was feeling okay, just couldn’t speed up when the others went,” Evenepoel said. “You have some days like that and today it was my turn. … Let’s hope that today was one of the worst days of these (three) weeks.”

The stage in eastern Spain shook up the standings, with several riders who are not considered contenders for the overall title able to move into the top 10 in the general classification. Marc Soler is third, Wout Poels fourth and Mikel Landa sixth.

It was Kuss’ third grand tour stage win. The 28-year-old American won a Vuelta stage in 2019 and a stage of the 2021 Tour.

Friday's seventh stage is a flat 201-kilometer (125-mile) ride from Utiel to Oliva on Spain’s eastern coast.