Mikel Landa abandons Il Lombardia 2019

The Italian Monument will be the last time Landa races in a Movistar jersey

Mikel Landa at the Tour de France 2019 (Marco Bertorello/AFP/Getty Images)
(Image credit: AFP/Getty Images)

Mikel Landa has abandoned Il Lombardia in what was his last race for Movistar.

The Spaniard climbed off with 62km remaining as he began the climb to Muro di Sormano, with Bob Jungels (Deceuninck - Quick-Step) simultaneously launching an attack to bridge the gap to team-mate Remi Cavagna, Fausto Masnada (Androni Giocattoli - Sidermec) and Toms Skujins (Trek-Segafredo) up the road.

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Movistar still have Alejandro Valverde as a hopeful for the win, who will face stiff competition from Egan Bernal (Ineos) and Primož Roglič (Jumbo-Visma) as the racing intensifies as the peloton approach Como.

At the time of writing the reason behind Landa's abandonment had not yet been announced by Movistar.

The 29-year-old has started all four previous Italian one-day races this past week, the Giro dell'Emilia, the Gran Premio Bruno Beghelli, Milano-Torino and Gran Piemonte, but has not finished any of them.

Mikel Landa will move to Bahrain-Merida in 2020 after two years with the Spanish team, rejoining Rod Ellingworth who he worked with previously during his time at Team Sky.

 

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Hi. I'm Cycling Weekly's Weekend Editor. I like writing offbeat features and eating too much bread when working out on the road at bike races.


Before joining Cycling Weekly I worked at The Tab and I've also written for Vice, Time Out, and worked freelance for The Telegraph (I know, but I needed the money at the time so let me live).


I also worked for ITV Cycling between 2011-2018 on their Tour de France and Vuelta a España coverage. Sometimes I'd be helping the producers make the programme and other times I'd be getting the lunches. Just in case you were wondering - Phil Liggett and Paul Sherwen had the same ham sandwich every day, it was great.