The third stage is the queen stage of the tour. The final climb is way longer than the one we had yesterday and we should see more time gaps and probably not one of the breakaway riders winning for the third time in a row.
At the first intermediate sprint of the day the breakaway group was already made. Nilsson passed first the line. The other escapes were: Murphy, Van Den Eynde, Nino, Ascani, Lejman, Jeannesson, Trimofeev, Cassidy and Kirsch.
As yesterday we have a smaller climb than the final one somewhere at the middle of the route. And that climb made the first victims of the day as Ascani and Murphy weren't able to keep it up with the other escapes
Kirchs was first at the summit, followed by Jeannesson and Nino.
Even though at the top Lejman was only a few meters behind the leaders he wasn't able to come back in the group on the downhill
At the end of the climb 4 riders attacke from the pack but none of them are real favorites: Rabou, Johnson, Madrazo, Diaz Corrales
NVidia, Nos and Energie - Diesel are leading the pack behind them and their advantage is less than 1 minute. Also the escapes aren't far away so we finaly might see a fight for the stage win between the real favorites
After an while the 4 attackers caught Ascani, Murphy and Lejman
After being first at the summit of the previous climb, Kirsch also takes the intermediate sprint, followed by Timofeev and Jeannesson
But when the others passed that sprint they are almost caught by the pack which happened just a few moments later
As soon as they were caught we had a new bunch of attacks: Vansummeren, Ortega, Craven and Ghyllebert. Way bigger names this time including the yellow jersey wearer in a surprise move here
They soon joined the breakaway group
But that just made some of the escapes start an attack as well
Timofeev wins the last intermediate sprint but the pack is less than one minute behind and looking at the climb it's no enough for him to stay in front
Timofeev is indeed the first rider onto the final summit of the day
Cassidy and Van Den Eynde are in the chasing group
While all the others, including the yellow jersey Vansummeren, were brought back in the pack. Not a good move there by Johan
But after a few moments the other 3 escapes left were also caught as none of them was a good climber
The real attacks started then with Becerra and Garate
But they were really fast brough back in the pack. Alarcon made the next attack, followed by Ardila Cano
Caruso is right after them
Perez Cuapio is also coming. No chance for Caruso to attack without Perez Cuapio in his wheel
But the pack isn't far away behind so more and more riders are joining the group, including the previous attackers Garate and Becerra
Still Perez Cuapio seems to be a little bit stronger than the others and he makes a small gap between him and Caruso, who also has a small gap between him and Ardila Cano
Perez Cuapio is very close to enter the last kilometer
Caruso is in the second position but can he catch and beat the Mexican Champion?
In the third group we have only 3 riders left: Kiserlovski, Alarcon and Ardila
Even though he was the only rider not to sprint Perez Cuapio keeps his lead in the last corner
And the Energie Diesel rider takes the win. Caruso is second same time with Perez Cuapio
Alarcon is third, 37 seconds behind. Kiserlovski and Ardila are also in the group
Becerra is 6th, good results for him, 1 minute and 9 seconds behind the winner
Garate leads the next group that also contains Basso, who crashed yesterday. Ferrio and Bosisio are closing the top 10
Not a good day for Vansummere. He tried there an attack but he just lost his energy for nothing. Perez Cuapio is the new leader of the race
