Before the stage, Van Aert told Het Laatste Nieuws that the corners "certainly don't work against me" and that short efforts come down to "pure power" — a read the Monaco circuit flatly rejected. He'd even recreated the route in training to close the gap between preparation and execution. It wasn't enough: 8th place, 9 seconds back, red jersey gone to a rider who understood that braking points, not power output, wrote the result sheet on day one of Vuelta a España 2026.