Marc Soler came to the bottom of the final climb of the Queen Stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné with a gap of 4:20 to the peloton, seemingly well-placed to take the solo win from a breakaway, a feat the UAE Team Emirates rider last achieved at the 2022 Vuelta a Espana.
But standing between the Spaniard and the finish line stood both the final 10km Hors Categorie ascent of Samoëns 1600 with an average gradient of 9%, as well as yellow jersey Primož Roglič and his Bora-Hansgrohe team.
After controlling the gap to the breakaway for most of the 155.3km stage 7, Roglič’s teammates amped up the pace dispatching riders off the back on the brutal climb.
A suffering Soler saw his lead vanish, and halfway up, he started looking behind him, until he was finally caught with two kilometres to go. He could only watch a select group ride by him, as they went on to the top where Roglič took the win.
The Spaniard had hoped that his deficit of 3:45 in the general classification would provide him enough of a buffer, but it wasn’t to be. He ultimately crossed the line in 11th place, 3:15 behind the winner.
“I'm happy that the condition is good. I try but this climb was so hard, very steep, “ Soler told CyclingProNet and other media at the finish. “I was far in the GC then I wanted to try. We take time, but here this climb was too hard and I cannot do anything.”
Soler was key to igniting the breakaway of the day when he got away with two riders after 20 kilometres of action and they were soon joined by more riders, making it 10 escapees off the front.
By the time, the break crested the first category Col des Saisies, 33km into the stage, they had a lead of 2:50 on the peloton. Their gap had increased to over four minutes as they went over Côte d’Araches making Soler the virtual leader on the road.
The next first category climb of Col de la Ramaz took its toll on the escapees, and they began to attack each other. Soler countered an attack from Warren Barguil (dsm-firmenech PostNL) and continued on solo and increased his lead to 5:28 with 37 kilometres to go.
Soler lost time on the downhill, and in the valley before the final ascent of the day with the Bora-led peloton chasing hard. The lead group was down to about 10 riders by the time they caught Soler.
When asked if he realized the damage that the chase did, Soler simply added, “I try and then the people want to follow but I needed to arrive here [the bottom of the final climb-Ed.] with a lot of time.”
With one stage to go, the third mountain-top finish in three days, Soler sits 7:07 from Roglič, and hopes he can get away for one more chance to glory.
“Tomorrow [Sunday] we will have another opportunity. Then we will try if the legs are ok.”
Soler will be part of the UAE Team Emirates line-up for the Tour de France for leader Tadej Pogačar in July as he targets a historic Giro-Tour double.
“The Tour will be hard because we will need to work a lot because Tadej is in a very good shape. Then I want to finish the Dauphiné in good condition and we will see.”
