Matthew Brennan finishes ahead of race leader Tadej Pogačar to win stage 2 of Spanish Vuelta

MANOSQUE, France (AP) — Young British rider Matthew Brennan finished strongly to win the second and longest stage of the Spanish Vuelta ahead of race leader Tadej Pogačar on Sunday.

The 21-year-old Brennan capitalized on good work from Visma-Lease a Bike teammate Wout van Aert in an uphill sprint and got ahead of second-place Pau Miquel and third-place Pogačar to complete the 214.3-kilometer (133.1 mile) hilly trek through Provence in southern France in 4 hours, 47 minutes, 47 seconds.

Pogačar, who edged Ethan Hayter by 0.09 seconds in the opening time trial on Saturday, kept the race leader’s red jersey by finishing with the same time as the stage winner.

The Slovenian leads the general classification by 9 seconds from Van Aert, with Brennan another second behind in third.

There were attacks from the start Sunday before Hayter, Koen Bouwman, Diego Uriarte, and Sinuhé Fernandez got away from the main bunch.

They stayed in front but could never get far enough ahead of the peloton. Hayter, thinking of the red jersey, went solo with just under 50 kilometers to go. The British rider was caught, however, and Pogačar was at the front of the peloton with 34 kilometers remaining, when it looked ever more likely to end in a sprint finish.

Teams jostled for position on the wide road as the kilometers slipped by, with UAE Emirates XRG, Visma-Lease a Bike, Lidl-Trek, Groupama-FDJ United and Netcompany Ineos all getting their leaders to the front for the grand finale to come.

Van Aert attacked with just under 2 kilometers to go, followed by Pogačar. They were joined by Alessandro Romele, then others, before Brennan emerged to take his first stage victory on his Grand Tour debut just over two weeks after his 21st birthday.

Pogačar was 20 when he made his Grand Tour debut at the Vuelta in 2019. He won three stages and finished third at the time, then didn’t race the Vuelta again till he returned on Saturday.

The Slovenian won the Tour de France for the third time straight time and fifth overall in July, while his Giro d’Italia win in 2024 puts him in position to become just the ninth male rider to win all three Grand Tours after Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault, Jacques Anquetil, Felice Gimondi, Alberto Contador, Chris Froome, Vincenzo Nibali and Jonas Vingegaard.

Guatemalan rider Sergio Chumil was the first to abandon the race after a bad crash. Cian Uijtdebroeks crashed earlier Sunday but he managed to get back on his bike.

Monday will see the riders tackle the first mountain stage of the 81st edition, a tough 174-kilometer (108-mile) route from Gruissan-Aude past the city of Perpignan before the climb to the ski resort of Font Romeu in the Pyrenees.

The Vuelta finishes in the southern Spanish city of Granada on Sept. 13.

See full AP coverage of European sports here

Britain's Matthew Brennan celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win the second stage of the La Vuelta cycling race, with start in Monaco and finish in Manosque, France, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Philippe Magoni)

Britain's Matthew Brennan celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win the second stage of the La Vuelta cycling race, with start in Monaco and finish in Manosque, France, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Philippe Magoni)

Britain's Matthew Brennan celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win the second stage of the La Vuelta cycling race, with start in Monaco and finish in Manosque, France, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Philippe Magoni)

Britain's Matthew Brennan sprints to win the second stage of the La Vuelta cycling race, with start in Monaco and finish in Manosque, France, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Philippe Magoni)

Britain's Matthew Brennan celebrates as he crosses the finish line to win the second stage of the La Vuelta cycling race, with start in Monaco and finish in Manosque, France, Sunday, Aug. 23, 2026. (AP Photo/Philippe Magoni)

WASHINGTON (AP) — More than 2,000 flights were canceled Saturday as airlines across the U.S. worked to dig out from the longest nationwide ground stop in 25 years, which stranded passengers and forced professional and college sports teams to scramble for alternate transportation.

Trump administration officials said new technology being added to the nation’s air traffic control system overloaded antiquated equipment and caused “intermittent” communications and radar gaps, leading to the flight shutdown of more than four hours.

A limited number of domestic flights departed after the stop was lifted around 8:15 p.m. ET. But the effects could be felt for days, with officials saying the system is likely to be operating normally in time to handle the Thanksgiving travel rush.

The nationwide stop was the first since January 2023, when another key FAA computer system that sends notices to pilots malfunctioned, and the second since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Emily Brown and her 14-year-old daughter waited more than four hours Friday at the Dallas airport for their flight to Columbus, Ohio, before giving up. They were traveling to surprise her daughter’s best friend. Instead, she had to settle for phoning the friend through tears in the airport, Brown said.

“She saved up her money to buy her own ticket, and she’s planned this whole weekend,” Brown said. “Now we’re not sure when we’re gonna be able to go.”

Ruth Coles was stuck on her plane for more than five hours after landing at Los Angeles International Airport from Newark, New Jersey. She said the passengers were told they were waiting for a gate to open.

“The pilot keeps saying they are telling him we are next in line,” Coles said.

At airports across the U.S., passengers stared at screens showing delays or rushed to find buses or trains to their destinations. Some passed the time by breaking out in song.

Sports teams scheduled to play this weekend adjusted game start times, searched for hotel rooms, rescheduled flights and chartered buses.

Auburn University's football team opted to take a bus to Mississippi State and the Saturday start time was pushed from noon ET to 4:15 p.m. Other universities affected by the stoppage included Baylor, Washington, Kansas State, Minnesota and No. 19 Ole Miss, which did not plan to fly until Saturday morning for its game against Oklahoma.

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy encouraged NCAA football teams to reach out to the FAA so the agency can prioritize flights for Saturday games.

More than 2,500 flights were canceled in the U.S. Saturday and hundreds more were delayed, according to FlightAware, a website that tracks flight disruptions.

Corbyn Wascher's flight was on the tarmac at the Charlotte Douglas International Airport for four hours Friday on his way home to Moline, Illinois, from a conference in Miami. Everyone was cordial on the American Airlines plane as they talked and stretched their legs and the flight attendants handed out water, pretzels and biscotti snacks, he said.

“The stewardesses were amazing. You could tell that they were pretty stressed out,” said the 37-year-old high school teacher, who took a $100 uber to a hotel 25 minutes from the airport after he was unable to find new flights. He was scheduled for a Saturday afternoon flight to Chicago O’Hare International Airport.

Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin told reporters at the White House that no one was in any danger as more than 3,000 flights were safely landed Friday.

Duffy blamed Congress for failing to approve more funding for new technology, while downplaying the fact that trying to implement new fixes overtaxed the system. He suggested more disruptions might occur.

“We didn’t think we would have this kind of outage. We did,” he said. “We were able to review what went wrong, and then reboot the system and go. But, you will have more of these.”

Duffy said the problems were not linked to the FAA’s new AI-powered system the agency is rolling out to help predict problems in the sky because that isn’t connected to Friday's failure.

“This is all the old legacy equipment. All of the new equipment that’s been deployed did not go down,” Duffy said.

The FAA has already replaced thousands of old copper wires with fiber optic lines and upgraded hundreds of radio systems as part of the overhaul that began last year after Congress approved $12.5 billion of funding. Duffy and the White House are pushing for $30 billion more to complete the work.

The problem appeared similar to a regional air traffic control communication outage in September that snarled hundreds of flights across the Northeast, although that disruption was linked to a construction crew cutting a fiber optic line. Aging equipment was also blamed for the brief radar outages last year that disrupted Newark airport.

Aviation safety expert Steve Arroyo said the difference this time is it happened on a nationwide scale that left controllers unable to reliably talk to pilots.

“If you don’t have that ability, whether it’s because the old wires that they have are just run down or for whatever reason, you’ve got to stop airplanes on the ground and not put them in the air, where you’re going to risk not being able to communicate with them,” said Arroyo, a former United Airlines pilot.

Friday’s ground stop also was different from the one after 9/11 because planes were not being told to land immediately and pilots likely were able to communicate with ground controllers at airports, Arroyo said.

Funk reported from Omaha, Nebraska, and Golden from Seattle. Associated Press journalists Mead Gruver in Fort Collins, Colorado; Jessica Hill in Las Vegas; Ali Swenson in Chicago; Alex Veiga and Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles; Seung Min Kim and Aamer Madhani in Washington; and Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City contributed to this report.

Passenger watch as workers unload luggage from a United plane as flights are delayed at Los Angeles International Airport Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Ethan Swope)

Passengers wait as flights are delayed inside a terminal at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Lindsey Wasson)

The sun sets over Dallas Fort Worth International Airport in DFW Airport, Texas, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, after the Federal Aviation Administration grounded flights nationwide. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez)

A passenger moves through Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International airport as all flights are canceled or delayed, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Mike Stewart)

People wait at a terminal at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, in Arlington, Va., after the FAA issued a nationwide ground stop. (AP Photo/Tom Brenner)

An agent helps travelers at a ticketing desk at LaGuardia Airport in New York, Friday, Nov. 13, 2026, after the Federal Aviation Administration grounded flights nationwide. (AP Photo/Ryan Murphy)