A 14 man breakaway goes away, the biggest name being Stage 1 crash victim Lloret
Murgoitio
Lloret, Rooijackers
Seledkov
Quintana
Longo Borghini, Santambrogio
Passeron
Stubbe
Adams
Lima
Salgueiro
Biondo
Preidler
Biondo won both intermediate sprints, Passeron was 2nd in both, with Murgoitio and Stubbe both taking a 3rd place.
They led by 4 minutes with 75km to go, when Jeremy Roy went on an ambitious attack. Roy catches the break on the first of the two main climbs of the day. 57km to go and already the break's lead is down to 2 minutes.
Lloret takes the points at the top of the climb from Stubbe and Preidler
A short descent and then onto the long main climb of the day. Already struggling after the first climb, Ziegler is dropped
Noval, Moinard and Grau attack from the peloton but dont get away and with 9km still to climb, the break has been caught
4.5 kilometres of actionless climbing follow, before at last an attack: Samuel Sanchez
Weening counters but cannot catch Sanchez, who quickly establishes a lead of 90 seconds over the peloton
It takes until the final kilometre of the climb for more attacks. Again it is Roy who leads the way
Here is the situation over the top:
S. Sanchez
Weening
+ 40
LL. Sanchez
+ 1'12
Roy
+ 1'20
Kolobnev
Marzano
Valverde
Cobo
+ 1'44
Pineau
Costa
Di Maggio
Salerno
Belkov
De la Fuente
Grau
Wyss
Hesjedal
+ 2'37
Moinard
Augustyn
Calzati
De Maar
+ 2'52
Hermans
Lloret
Voeckler
Zaballa
Santambrogio
Noval
Vital
Salgueiro
Seledkov
De Greef
Pires
Wu
Roche
+ 3'26
The obvious thing to notice here is Nicolas Roche, who has a shocker of a climb. Disastrous for Pirelli.
We now proceed into a long descent, with plenty of flat or slight uphill sections to aid aggressive moves, and immediately Valverde launches his pursuit. He crosses solo to Weening
Luis Leon Sanchez also crosses to Weening, by which time Valverde has dropped the Dutchman. Since the top of the climb, Valverde has already gained 1 minute on Samuel Sanchez.
20km to go: S. Sanchez
Valverde + 23
Weening + 40 LL. Sanchez
Cobo + 1'07 Kolobnev Marzano
De la Fuente + 1'24
Di Maggio + 1'50 Wyss Pineau Belkov Roche Grau Calzati Salerno Costa
Roy + 2'27 Hesjedal Moinard Augustyn De Maar Hermans Lloret Voeckler Zaballa Santambrogio Noval Vital Salgueiro Seledkov De Greef Pires
Wu + 3'56
Already Roche has been on a charge and made his way past a number of riders, including Jeremy Roy, who seems to have struggled quite a bit and lost contact with those he was with, and even with some who he was ahead of.
With 17km to go, Valverde has caught S Sanchez.
LL Sanchez is really pushing behind though. With some help from Weening, the gap is down to 24 seconds
At another 30 seconds, De la Fuente has linked up with teammate Cobo, plus Kolobnev and Marzano
Theres another 30 seconds to the chasing group of 9, which Di Maggio now attacks from
Roche bridges to Di Maggio, while Roy, Hesjedal and Augustyn have caught up to the group just behind. De Greef was also with them as they bridged, but didnt quite make it
Into the final 10km, we can see the first 10 riders in the race, spread out in their groups.
S. Sanchez
Valverde
Weening
+ 20
LL. Sanchez
Cobo
+ 51
Kolobnev
Marzano
De la Fuente
Di Maggio
+ 1'22
Roche
Wyss
+ 1'42
Pineau
Belkov
Roy
Hesjedal
Grau
Calzati
Salerno
Costa
Augustyn
De Greef
+ 2'15
Hermans
+ 3'02
Voeckler
+ 3'44
Moinard
De Maar
Pires
Lloret
Santambrogio
Zaballa
Noval
Seledkov
Valverde is not content to ride with Samuel Sanchez to the finish though, and starts to gap him in the descent
And into the final 5km he attacks to try to keep this gap. Meanwhile, LL Sanchez is doing his best to drop Weening
With 3km to go, Samuel Sanchez has caught up with Valverde
Valverde soon starts the sprint, and for the first time, these 2 are gaining on LL Sanchez again - gap up to 32 seconds
Sanchez waits, and launches in the final kilometre
And Samuel Sanchez wins the stage!
Valverde is 2nd, and thanks to his time bonus yesterday, he takes over the race lead - although being on the same time now as Sanchez.
3rd for Luis Leon Sanchez, but the final few kilometres were very costly - he crosses the line 1'12 down. Weening was gapped, but not enough, and so gets the same time as Luis Leon.
De la Fuente takes 5th place, 1'26 down
Di Maggio and Roche have been joined late on by Roche and finish at 1'53
Augustyn then takes 12th, leading in a group of 9 at 2'15
Ziegler ultimately lost 16 minutes, and not only does Valverde take the race lead, but the points classification aswell. Samuel Sanchez is the new KoM leader and Di Maggio is far and away the best young rider. Bianchi were the best team on the day, but Unicredit and TCS Bank are the 2 leading the teams classification.
