Lenny Martinez will have dreamed for 48 hours. The French rider of Groupama-FDJ, the youngest leader of a Grand Tour since Henri Cornet in 1904, gave up his red jersey on Saturday September 2 to the American Sepp Kuss, at the end of the 8th stage of the Tour d’ Spain between Dénia and Xorret de Cati. It was the Slovenian Primoz Roglic who won in the Alicante hinterland ahead of the Belgian Remco Evenepoel – the main favorites were neutralized.
The contenders for final victory, including Tour de France winner Jonas Vingegaard and Enric Mas, made the hole behind them on the terrible climb of the Xorret de Cati, before finishing grouped in the final of this mountain stage.
First Frenchman, Lenny Martinez crossed the finish line 1’10” behind Roglic. In the general classification, the son of Miguel Martinez, Olympic mountain bike champion in Sydney in 2000, is in 3rd place, one minute behind Kuss, who became leader almost in spite of himself in the Jumbo-Visma.
