Defending champion Primoz Roglic won the start of the 77th Tour of Spain with his Dutch Jumbo Visma team.
The team won the home game in Utrecht, Netherlands, in the 23.3-kilometer team time trial in a time of 24:40 minutes and, with Dutchman Robert Gesink, is the first person to wear the red jersey of the overall leader of the Vuelta á España 2022.
Second place went to the British team Ineos Grenadiers around Olympic champion Richard Carapaz (Ecuador), 13 seconds behind. The third fastest team was a second behind the Belgian Quick-Step AlphaVinyl team with Belgium’s cycling hope Remco Evenepoel.
Bora-hansgrohe in seventh place
The German Bora-hansgrohe team led by Australian Giro winner Jai Hindley finished seventh, 41 seconds behind. Jumbo Visma captain Roglic had finished the Tour of Spain as overall winner three times since 2019.
The second stage on Saturday covers 175.1 kilometers from s-Hertogenbosch to Utrecht. The third section in the Netherlands ends on Sunday after 193.2 kilometers with start and finish in Breda. After the first rest day on Monday, the race then resumes on Tuesday on Spanish soil in the Basque Country.
The last of the three major national tours comes to an end in three weeks in Spain’s capital Madrid.