For those with a trained eye, there had been a few clear signs in the build-up to the Vuelta a España that on his eighth appearance in his home Grand Tour, and two years after his fourth and last podium finish there, Enric Mas would finally win the Spanish race.

While the cycling world was fixated on the Tour de France in July — a race that Mas was missing for the first time since 2018 — the Mallorca-born rider was training at altitude in the small principality of Andorra in the Pyrenees.

“I realised Enric was in top form and going to perform better than what people were expecting when we were in Andorra,” Iván Romeo, his Movistar team-mate tells The Athletic. “I saw that he was feeling really strong and he was saying it himself too.

“He’s usually very quiet, but he kept saying how good he was feeling. So when he was saying that, you knew that he wasn’t just ‘good’, but ‘really good’.”

There was another hint — this one visible to more than just a select few people — when Mas and his Spanish team descended on another principality, Monaco, for the race’s start.

Plastered across all of the race organizer’s vehicles and other race-branded livery were four words: “La Vuelta es Mas”.

It was in reference to the various socio-economic benefits of the race, “más” meaning “more” in Spanish, but as it transpired, three weeks of gruelling racing later, the Vuelta would indeed be Mas.

This article was published by The Athletic/NYT during September 2026. You can read the full article here