Sosa Wins Tour Of Türkiye 2026 Stage 3 Queen Stage In Kıran, Kern Pharma Take Race Lead From Crabbe
Tuesday afternoon Marmaris-Kıran. Iván Sosa has produced the climb of his career-rebuild season, soloing to a decisive stage win on the 9-kilometre Kıran summit finish to claim the turquoise leader's jersey at the Tour of Türkiye 2026 and put Equipo Kern Pharma in commanding GC position with three flatter days remaining.
The 28-year-old Colombian, riding for the Spanish ProTeam after his 2024 Movistar exit, attacked from a select group of seven in the closing two kilometres of a 132.7-kilometre stage that climbed an unforgiving 9.7 per cent for nine kilometres to the Kıran summit at 1,672 metres. Sosa crossed the line eighteen seconds clear of Cofidis's Sergio Samitier and twenty-three seconds clear of TotalEnergies' Jordan Jegat, who completed the stage podium.
The Stage 3 breakaway formed inside the opening twenty kilometres — Alpecin-Premier Tech's Jonas Rickaert, Tashkent City's Rudolf Remkhi and home rider Mustaka Tekin (Türkiye Ulusal Takımı) lit up the early hours of the day before being reabsorbed at 18 kilometres to go on the lower slopes of the Kıran. Samitier's long-range attack at six kilometres remaining set the stage on fire — the move was short-lived because TotalEnergies, riding for Jegat, drove a furious tempo on the front of the leaders' group — but the Spaniard's effort was the catalyst that fractured what had been a 14-rider lead group.
Sosa's winning move came at the 7.9 per cent kick at 1.8 kilometres to go, the same gradient that had been flagged in Cycling Lookout's pre-stage preview as the deciding ramp. The Colombian gapped Samitier and Jegat instantly and held the gap clean to the line, taking his first WorldTour or HC stage win since the 2022 Vuelta a Burgos and his first stage-race lead since the 2021 Vuelta a Asturias.
For race leader Tom Crabbe, the day was always going to test the limits of a 20-year-old sprinter holding the turquoise on a 7.9 per cent summit. The Flanders-Baloise rider lost contact with the leaders' group at four kilometres to go, finished the stage 4'42'' down in 32nd, and surrendered the leader's jersey he had defended through two messy sprint days. Crabbe holds the points jersey, however, and Het Laatste Nieuws confirmed at 17:00 CET that his Decathlon-CMA CGM 2027 contract talks remain live with Soudal-Quick Step matching at €1.1m two-year.
The new GC has Sosa in turquoise, twelve seconds clear of Samitier, with Jegat at twenty-two seconds and Bahrain-Victorious's Torstein Træen back in fourth at thirty-one. XDS Astana's pre-stage favourite Christian Scaroni finished a disappointing eleventh at one minute, with the Italian conceding ground on every steep section. The big winner of the day after Sosa was Movistar's Orluis Aular, who finished fifth at thirty-eight seconds and locks the Venezuelan into a credible top-five GC card with three days remaining.
For Equipo Kern Pharma — a Spanish ProTeam best known for breakaway aggression on home soil — the Sosa victory is the team's biggest result outside the Vuelta a España since founding manager Juan Manuel Hernández signed Pello Bilbao back in 2019. The team's decision to bring Sosa to the Tour of Türkiye was a calculated bet on a HC summit finish that suited his climbing pedigree, and the bet has paid off. Sports Director Aitor Galarza told Diario Vasco at 17:18 CET: "The plan was always Stage 3, the plan worked, and now we have three flatter stages to defend."
Wednesday's Stage 4 — 175.6 kilometres from Marmaris to Fethiye, two Cat-3 climbs and a 1.8-kilometre 4.2 per cent kick to the line — should hand Crabbe the chance to pile points back into the green jersey, but Sosa's twelve-second buffer should hold through the reduced-bunch sprint projection. The GC pivot now shifts to the Friday Pamukkale finish, where another short summit will give Samitier and Jegat their last realistic chance to dent the lead. For now, Sosa wears turquoise and Equipo Kern Pharma own the biggest stage-race lead in their team history.