In the fourth stage of the Vuelta a España, Team LottoNL-Jumbo showed its best. Lars Boom obtained a ticket for the day’s breakaway and was only caught on the final climb. On the Sierra de la Alfaguara, Steven Kruijswijk and George Bennett subsequently completed the teamwork by finishing in a select classification group. Doing so they gained some places in the general classification.

Boom was actually struggling on the last days, but suddenly he found himself in today’s leading group. "That has made the day much easier. Especially because we immediately gained such a huge advantage. I’ve been able to save some energy this way. We got more time than I expected beforehand. So in the end I still managed to help my teammates," Boom said.

The rest of the team also excelled in assisting both leaders Kruijswijk and Bennett. "We had a good plan," Sepp Kuss explained. "We wanted to take the initiative at the very bottom of the final climb. We all had to play our part, making the climb hard for our GC riders. Floris (De Tier) set a really, really hard pace through the town and had us all on the limit. Then I started riding until I couldn’t go anymore. It's nice to have a good performance as a team. Everyone was riding super. We knew that we have a strong team."

Sports director Addy Engels agrees with that. "Steven and George have already shown that they are okay for three days. They did that again today, so that's good. What the team showed, is impressive. Take control and continue. We have had a very good year, but we are not used to this yet. When Floris went head-to-head, Kwiatkowski was already alone as a GC leader. It is encouraging that we were still well represented in such a small group. In the end, it has to come from Steven and George themselves to keep competing with the best riders.”