Delgado still looks like a very likely winner of this stage race, but on the other hand, he and his team did show signs of weaknesses. This stage is longer, and the final mountain is longer. Is Zaugg up for another major performance?
As always, there were no atta ... wait, actually, Wei from Bbox decided to attack right from the start. Alone. Despite a mountain stat of 59. Surely, he will enjoy the fact that he managed to get some mountain points as he was the first to pass the first of two mountain sprints on this stage.
It was a quite nervous stage, apparently, as first Machado crashed (quickly regained contact) and shortly after Niyonshuti from the Control Team. The peloton was still taking it easy, though. proven by the fact that Wei had gained a gap of 8 minutes with 55 km to go.
More importantly, F. Chacon and D. Martinez - important helpers for Delgado and Rodas - participated in the intermediate sprint before the long, final mountain. Surprisingly, they decided to keep going after the sprint, leaving it to other teams to do the work. Smart move.
Although the two didn't cooperate well, they did create a gap of 3 minutes rather quickly, Quiksilver decided to bring the two back, though, before the final, steep part of the mountain. At this point, Wei was struggling 1'30 ahead.
Quiksilver weren't going to relax for long, though. With 18 km to go, Rodas, 2nd in the GC, attacked.
Other than Martinez, who had used his energy in the breakaway, Delgado was once again left without team mates. Instead, Quintero took the front - until he attacked! Astarloza, Delgado and Chacon responded while Benfica - with 6 riders in the peloton - apparently had other tactics.
Also, a quick SS of Benfica. There's 10 riders left in the P, 6 of them are from Benfica. Pretty cool.
In front, Delgado continued his tactics of attacking until everyone else have given up. Chacon and Quintero managed to hang on with Rodas struggling behind and Astarloza behind him. With 10 km to go, they had 1'07 to the peloton, 37 seconds to Astarloza and 19 seconds to Rodas.
In the peloton, it was still Benfica completely dominating. They had dropped Zaugg, F. Chacon, Laverde and their own Salgueiro, leaving them with 5 Benfica-riders and Schwab. With 7 km to go, they caught Astarloza, but now realizing that they weren't gaining time on the Delgado group, Colorado attacked.
Not caring much for what was going on behind him, Quintero went to the front of the three-man-group and pushed the pace - and surprisingly, sign of weakness from Delgado was revealed. With help from the Devil, Quintero just had 3 km of climbing to do.
The attack by Colorado had bridged the gap to Rodas and Schwab had managed to stay with them too. Zaugg was still stuck in the peloton, though.
In the front, Quintero now just had 1 km left, and with a gap of 35 seconds to Delgado and Chacon, it was looking good. 27 secs behind them, Colorado had now dropped Rodas and Schwab.
As on the previous stage, Delgado's sprinting from behind. That won't change the fact that Quintero has won this stage - YouTube - Twitter's 2nd stage in row!
