Sept 14 (Reuters) - Belgium's Remco Evenepoel claimed his third victory in this year's Vuelta a Espana with a solo attack on a mountainous stage 18 and Jumbo-Visma's Sepp Kuss moved a step closer to winning his first Grand Tour on Thursday. Evenepoel's hopes of fighting the Jumbo-Visma riders for the overall title evaporated on stage 13 when he was dropped on the Col d'Aubisque and lost 27 minutes. "It was a super good opportunity to take the points for my jersey -- I took all the points -- and my third stage win is amazing to end the Vuelta with." Provided he avoids any mishaps on Friday and Saturday, Kuss will be a popular champion in Madrid. Vingegaard, who has been helped often by Kuss, warned that there is still a tough stage on Saturday and that the team needed to keep fighting.

---

Persons: Remco Evenepoel, Sepp Kuss, Evenepoel, La Cruz de, Pola de Allande, Kuss, Jonas Vingegaard, Primoz Roglic, rojo, Vingegaard, It's, Evenepoel's, d'Aubisque, Italy's Damiano Caruso, Denmark's Andreas Kron, Roglic, Juan Ayuso, Sepp, Dane, Martyn Herman, Toby Davis Organizations: La, La Cruz de Linares, Pola de, de France, Giro, Eurosport, UAE Team Emirates, Enric, Thomson Locations: Puerto, Pola, Madrid, Bahrain, American