This is a rider who, on stage 6, closed a reported 40-second gap on the Puerto El Bartolo gravel climb without Pogačar's team even seeing him coming — a move that left Pogačar admitting «He flew past me like a rocket. I was not expecting it, because I heard on the radio that I was leading, I don't know, by 40 seconds to the second chasers, and there was no mention of Enric.» Mas has already shown he can close margins that shouldn't be closable. Refusing the podium jersey isn't him stepping back from the race; it's him marking that the real fight starts on stage 9's Alto de Aitana, not on a podium in someone else's absence.