3rd day and back to the sprinter competition. Forero won the first criterium and must be named as the top favourite today. But there are lots of other sprinters as well, who surely won`t give him a 2nd win that easily.
Yesterdays winner McEvoy and two time scorer Nardin are riders to watch as they could climb higher in the rankings.
Lemus Davila, S. Salas and Rojas Villegas in the early attempt. Behind them Brad Armstrong is trying to join to hold up the US flag.
5km later he indeed joins them. They have a 2min gap now but we see more attacks behind. Jessy Anthony is the next and probably it would have been smarter if he followed Armstrong already instead of going solo.
We have a fifth rider in front now but it`s not Anthony.
It`s the Colombian Bolivar bridging the gap which was a great effort as the gap is up to 3'56 already with just 31km to go.
Are the sprinters giving this away today?
7-Up for Manarelli and Chipotle for US-Sprinter Keough do the pace. Highly time as the really need to hurry up now.
In especially Busche (Chipotle) and Diaz (7-Up) are doing an excellent job here.
Somehow they managed to reduce the gap tp 1min with 16km to go. This are almost 3min in 15km.
Some riders use this moment to attack. In especially you can see the Sram duo Duggan/Warbasse. First mentioned once again tries it on these flat crits.
The others are Raabe and Routley, who missed the jump at yesterdays hilly crit.
10km to go and they join the breakaway with a 1'23 gap to the peloton. That said Duggan wasn`t able. Not sure if he wants to save energy for the more important hilly crits or if the manager called him back.
6km left and still a 1'06 gap. This actually could have been a good chance for Duggan to take easy points in the group as the gap is still looking good for the breakaway.
Just wow. 2km later the gap is gone. All attackers have been caught. Obviously they weren`t working very well together and the still chasing peloton caught them easily.
Time for another late attack. It`s Canadian Ryan Roth and we almost reach the 3km mark.
Nardin will have a hard time to score points today as he is the only leadout for Manarelli. But it`s Keough having his wheel actually ahead of the Brasilian sprinter.
As 4th we see the Costa Rican Guillen, Murphy, Forero and already McEvoy.
1km to go and Roth still having this small gap. Murphy once again can`t wait and goes first with McEvoy following him on the right.
Nardin is doing a great job brining Keough/Manarelli/Guillen until the Flamme Rouge while Forero also left the train to come on the left.
This is absolutely close. Not only is Roth still ahead but also all riders are nearly on one line with Manarelli and Keough being on the left side now and Guillen deciding to go on the right.
Roth is caught and also Murphy once again went too early while McEvoy can`t match the top sprinters here.
It will be a close fight now with Manarelli being in the lead with Keough and Forero being next and Guillen still a bit behind.
No time for celebration until after the line. Manarelli takes the win after Nardin`s great work. Keough on the 2nd ahead of Guillen and Forero.
Nardin being super-strong today still finishing on the 5th ahead of the 2nd GC guy in McEvoy. Big points for both of them.
Veilleux, Murphy, Horton and Roth on the last top 10`s.
Carlos Alexandre Manarelli
Jake Keough
Marco Guillén
Juan Pablo Forero
Jonathan McEvoy
David Veilleux
Juan Mora
Pablo Andres Alarcon
Eduardo Sepulveda
