Vuelta a Espana - the most important facts in brief
- Stage 7, Friday, 23 August
- Archidona - Cordoba, 180.5 kilometres, hilly
- Official start: 13:25
- Estimated arrival time: ~ 17:20 - 17:42
- TV broadcast: 14:30 - 18:00 Eurosport 1
- Live stream: Discovery Plus (subject to a charge)
- All stages of the Vuelta a Espana 2024 at a glance
- More info on TV broadcast & live stream
Vuelta 2024: Stage 7 - route, elevation profile and map
The riders will have to cover a transfer of around 100 kilometres from the finish of stage 6, Yunquera, to get to Archidona, the start of the seventh day. Geographically speaking, the Vuelta a Espana 2024 is still far to the south, in the province of Malaga, in Andalusia. The day's finish is in Cordoba, the capital of the province of the same name. After the start, the route heads south-west from the small town of Archidona with its 8,000 inhabitants. After just nine kilometres, the riders turn north in Antequerra.
There are no mountain classifications on the programme to begin with, but the route is anything but flat - a total of 1875 metres of elevation gain on stage 7. Many of which await in the finale. After the pros pass the finish line in Cordoba for the first time at kilometre 140, they head up the Alto del 14%. The name says it all - the mountain is named after its steepest ramp. Overall, the gradient averages 5.6 per cent over 7.4 kilometres. The route then continues briefly over a plateau before the descent follows. The last twelve kilometres are completely flat.
Sporting assessment of the 7th stage
A stage that opens up many scenarios, as a look at the past shows. There were also arrivals in Cordoba in 2011, 2014 and 2021, in which the Alto del 14% was on the programme in the finale. Magnus Cort Nielsen (2021) and John Degenkolb (2014) both won in the sprint of a thinned-out peloton. A different variant in 2011, when the then Team Liquigas with Peter Sagan and Vincenzo Nibali held off the competition in the descent from the Alto del 14%. In the end, Sagan won and Liquigas had four riders in the top 5.
Will a team resort to similarly audacious tactics 13 years later? Probably not. The question is whether a team with a hill-hard sprinter is prepared to control the race all day.
Schedule, TV coverage & live stream of stage 7 of the Vuelta a Espana 2024
The neutral start will take place at 13:10. The sharp start is scheduled for 13:25. The finish is expected at 17:20 with an average speed of 46 km/h, 17:30 with an average speed of 44 km/h and 17:42 with an average speed of 42 km/h.
Eurosport will broadcast all stages of the Vuelta a Espana 2024. Stage 7 will be shown free-to-air on Eurosport 1 from 14:30.* Including post-event coverage, the broadcast will run until 18:00. A live stream on the internet is also available from the paid provider Discovery Plus.
* Transmission times are subject to change.
