Second Basque classic at the start of August. Even though this one is rated as mountain and not as a hilly classic, Valverde seems to be the favorite to make the double after his win in San Sebastian.
13 escapes today, we’ll have to see if that was a lucky number or not: Gastauer, Johnson, Lundberg, Rabon, van der Hugenhaben, Wellens, Gallopin, Kessler, Roux, Galpasoro, Del Nero, Ortega and Mori
With 3 riders in the breakaway, Santander are clearly not interested in chasing the breakaway, job taken by Olympus AirAsia and Benfica, for Carrara and Marquez/Nazaret
100 kilometers before the finish the advantage isn’t a great one, just somewhere around 3 minutes
Behind them Santander and Energie Diesel also brought some riders now to help AirAsia and Benfica
30 kilometers later things began to look better for the escapes as they are now more than 5 minutes in front of the pack
With the 3 Santander riders not relaying in the breakaway it’s clear that Santander is gambling everything on Valverde and they are the main chasers, with Wii and Benfica also a real help
With just 30 kilometers left from the race, at the end of the first real difficulty of the day, Rabon and Kessler are leading the escapes, but they have only 1 minute and 40 seconds left from their advantage over the pack
But they were a little bit faster than the pack on the downhill and managed to increase their gap to 1 minute and 50 seconds with just 20 kilometers left. They actually have a chance to fight for the win today
Behind them, in the front of the pack you can see Benfica and Energie Diesel everything they can to catch the escapes. Also it looks like Marquez is Benfica’s man today as Nazaret is helping his team – mates involved in the chasing
Van der Hugenhaben is leading the leading group into the last 15 kilometers and their advantage is a pretty good one: 1 minute and 38 seconds which means that in the last 15km they lost almost nothing to the pack
Rabon, Kessler and van der Hugenhaben seem to be the strongest riders in the breakaway group and they are leading the other escapes into the last 10km. New gap: 1 minute and 13 seconds
But Energie Diesel, Benfica, Wii and Santander are coming faster and faster
When the first slopes of the final climb started, 8 kilometers before the finish, the escapes had left only a few seconds over a minute from their advantage
2 kilometers later when the pack was less than one minute behind them the attacks in the leading group started. Johnson made the first move, with Rabon and Roux right behind him
But the only one able to make a gap was Johnson, while the others were almost caught by the pack
Marquez and Kirchen were the first favorites to attack and soon joined the escapes
Carrara and Pedraza are also coming
They also joined the breakaway group pretty easily, while Johnson was brought back there
Nazaret also joins the group to help Marquez, bringing Gabrovski and the big favorite, Valverde, with him
Brajkovic and Perez Cuapio also joined the leaders, with less than 5 kilometers left, while some of the escapes started to crack and lose the contact
But Valverde isn’t happy with the current situation and 3 kilometers before the finish he attacks again
He wasn’t able to make a but the others can hardly follow him
Valverde is leading as they reach the final kilometer, followed by Marquez and then a group with Perez Cuapio, Pedraza, Brajkovic, Nazaret, Carrara and Kirchen
Even though he is a better sprinter than all the others Valverde can’t increase his advantage but the good news for him is that it doesn’t get smaller either
Marquez seems to be only real threat to Valverde in the last meters, while the others are struggling to hang on
Valverde stops sprinting as soon as he enters the last corner, but the others still aren’t able to get any closer
And Valverde does the Basque double! Today he won in front of Marquez and Brajkovic. Pedraza and Perze Cuapio also finished in the leading group, while Nazaret, Carrara and Kirchen lost a few seconds in the final meters
Kessler took the 9th place, being the highest ranked from the escapes, while Colom took the last spot on the top 10
