After the chaos and drama of Monday's torrential snowstorm, there was an altogether more familiar feel to the Vuelta a Espana 24 hours later as race leader Tadej Pogacar soloed to a sensational victory.The last time a Vuelta stage was held entirely in Andorra was seven years ago, when Pogacar secured his first win on his way to an overall third-place in what was his Grand Tour debut.Fast forward to 2026 and the UAE team Emirates-XRG rider is an altogether different beast – a sporting superstar with five Tour France titles and one Giro d'Italia to his name, with only La Vuelta left to tick off out of cycling's big three races. And judging by his complete demolition of the peloton in Tuesday's Stage 4, Pogacar is firmly on course to achieve that feat after finishing more than two and a half minutes clear at the front, having launched his solo attack with 50km of the 104.8km mountain stage still to go.It had been teed-up as a short but brutal route so early in the race – with 2,890m of climbing – but ended up with Pogacar winning by the biggest margin of his spectacular Grand Tour career to date.The 27-year-old crossed the finish line two minutes and 39 seconds before Jarnno Widar (Lotto Intermarche) and Felix Gall (Decathlon CMA CGM), who were second and third, respectively.Pogacar's lead in the general classification (GC) is now three minutes and 21 seconds over countryman Primoz Roglic with Enric ‌Mas (Movistar Team) a further second back.“I didn't have to do that,” said Pogacar, who also won the opening stage time-trial, albeit by just by 0.09 seconds. “But the pace was super high already on the first climb, and then on the second climb, we were going basically all out from the bottom.“Any gap is more than enough, but it's super good because now I can be calm and confident for the next days. We'll just keep going day by day and focus on each day after this, because it will be a little bit less stressful for sure.“Not in a second have I ever thought that I would ride like this ever. I have such beautiful memories from the first time in Andorra. It was really, really beautiful, and it's one of my favourite moments of my career, so I will never forget that day.“I will say you never know, but now it's a good gap, so we give our best to control it every day. But if it's uncontrollable, you can't control and we will have to fight. It's going to be tough, but we have a really strong team here, and we are ready.”Meanwhile, EF Education-EasyPost sports director Juanma Garate has spoken about the remarkable scenes that ended Monday's Stage 3 which had left riders desperately seeking shelter from a ferocious hailstorm with 15km left.The first summit finish of this year's race had to be abandoned with no winner and no podium ceremony, meaning Pogacar's nine-second lead in the GC remained untouched.“We did know that the temperatures were going to drop a lot, with nine or ten degrees expected in the finish line and rain maybe for the last 30 or 40 kilometres,” Garate told Cycling News. “What we didn't expect was such a violent storm. “It's always possible that it'll hail, that happens in summer storms, but we were lucky, too, because it started to hail really hard, and they couldn't take any other decision but stop the race.“It was impossible to ride on the asphalt, and it was impossible for us, because we couldn't see anything from the cars.“There were riders who got into spectators' cars, others who stood under trees, everybody just stopped where they could. The hailstones themselves, though, were large enough to mark riders' arms and legs with their impact.”Pogacar described the events as a “crazy experience” but praised race organisers for their swift response and the hotel IGESA Village Club Mont-Louis Les Sorbiers for allowing riders to shelter from the storm. “I think in the end the organisation did super well. Chapeau to them for cancelling the stage, I know it's not easy to do it,” the Slovenian said ahead of Stage 4. “And also Chapeau to the hotel for hosting us there for one hour and a half or something, bring us towels and we could shower, it was really good from them.“I was reading reviews today in the morning on Google and I think the hotel will now be quite famous!”Wednesday's Stage 5 is a 173.4km hilly route from Falset to Roquettes in Catalonia.Stage 4 results1. Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) 2:40:352. Jarno Widar (Lotto Intermarche) +2:393. Felix Gall (AUT) Decathlon CMA CGM Team ”4. Oscar Onley (Netcompany INEOS) ”5. Sepp Kuss (Team Visma-Lease a Bike) ”General Classifcation1. Tadej Pogacar UAE Team Emirates-XRG) 7:38:592. ⁠Primoz Roglic (Red ​Bull-BORA-hansgrohe) +3:213. ​Enric ‌Mas (Movistar Team) +3:324. Sepp Kuss (Team Visma-Lease a Bike) +3:445. Oscar Onley (Netcompany INEOS) +3:45