Devine caught up to the escapees soon and with 168km to go, Evaldas Siskevicius joins the group, which leads by more than 2 minutes. It seems we've found the first succesful breakaway.
The peloton faces the first tricky descent of the day, allowing the break to grow the lead to almost 4 minutes with 141km remaining.
Fabio Montenegro waited til the peloton entered today's second climb, launching a powerful attack. We've the first decent climber going clear, it ain't too surprising that Bintang tries a tactic like this.
Montenegro had no problems to bridge the gap, making the breakaway a group of 5. They lead by 4'20" with now 69km remaining, and the penultimate climb is right ahead!
Just as the peloton reaches today's last descent with 58km to go, the gap is down to 3'40".
Teams like Vueling, Vespa and also ING Project started to chase, already showing who's trying to fight for the line honours here.
But it's HTC with the first move by a top-favorite! Marquez attacks the pack (where no bigger split happened yet) with 25km remaining!
A quite early move, does he stand a chance?
At least not yet! Marquez is quickly pulled back by the pack and as the race goes into it's final 20km, also the breakaway group is reeled in!
So we've still 89 riders entering the final ascent. Both Bintang and Bouygues show their colors at the front of the field now.
No more esapees, so it's a perfect setup for the favorites to take control of the race. And shortly after the 20km-mark, we have a second serious attempt:
Alacorn attacked with several other top-favorites jumping behind:
Marquez, Dekker, Gomez Marchante, Pozzovivo, Taaramäe and Stetina look well aware of the situation so far.
And therefore it's a short-lived attack by Alacorn, but at least the peloton keeps splitting with every ascending km being raced:
12km before finish, the favorites are all together again, as a group of 32 riders is going to enter the last 10km after a short downhill sector. No notable name has been dropped yet.
Here we go again: this time it's Pozzovivo attacking the leading group! 10km remaining, he opens up a 19"-gap quickly.
The Italian mountain goat can't really establish a bigger gap though, as the chasing group (still 31 riders hanging on) is now led by Alacorn himself!
With 8km remaining, it's mostly due to Alacorn's work that the gap's down to 9"..
And Pozzovivo has been caught a few moments later.. and just as he was, we've another attack with 6.5km to go:
Abal and again Marquez now try to break clear! The chasing group is down to 19 riders with the pace getting more and more brutal.
Abal and Marquez couldn't hold on to their small lead. And who's next in line to launch his move?
It's Kashechkin with 4.4km remaining! Will we finally see a succesful attack?
Not yet. The veteran is pulled back by the group of favorites - where Dekker in leading position - and with 2.8km to go, we've 21 riders leading the race:
Dekker Kashechkin and Ardila Cano Taaramäe and Solis Alacorn and Orozco Abal Pozzovivo Gomez Marchante and Saldarriaga Marquez and Berard Stetina Caruso Kolesnikov and Kunshin Colorado Lövkvist, Eltink and Bjelkmark
Anyway, it's the top-favorites controlling the race the whole finishing climb and you will notice all of the big names at the front of the group.
2.3km to go and it's maybe the last chance for a decisive move:
Gomez Marchante, Pozzovio and Alacorn give it a try, while Dekker's still leading the group with Taaramäe, Marquez and Kashechkin behind!
No success for the attacking three! As we reach the final 2km, the leading group is still led by a strong Dekker, who's the main reason for another split.
So three more riders can't hang on with Dekker's pace. Will we see a last attack?
No attack, but the sprint to the line kicks off with 900 meters to go!
Dekker quickly establish an 8"-gap over Alacorn and Taaramäe!
Pozzovivo lost contact a few moments before, he's already down by 19" and unlikely to fight back!
Dekker looks too strong and his powerful kick might have given him the crucial gap!
9" behind the "last men standing" desperately try to close up..
But empty-handed, Thomas Dekker celebrates yet another great victory for Vueling! A deserved win, as the dutchman was in total control of the race for at least the final 5km, pulling back all the attackers mostly on his own.
Except of the first bigger move with all favorites being involved (20km before finish), Rein Taaramäe's tactic appeared to sit behind Dekker and wait for a final sprint.
He won't be too disappointed with taking today's 2nd ahead of Jose Alacorn, who tried to attack earlier.
Domenico Pozzovivo crosses the line as 4th, losing 47" on Dekker in the final km. He might have hoped for a podium, but couldn't compete with the Top-3 today.
Florentino Marquez 7th, beating David Abal in the sprint.. both definitely had hoped for more prior to the race. Both tried to attack. Both paid the price. But with a packed field like today's, their aggressive racing definitely made sense.
Peter Stetina beats Gianpaolo Caruso for 9th place! A great result for Meiji and on the other hand a rather disappointing race for Caruso, who never looked in position to try something special today.
Thomas Lövkvist finishes 11th, 2'07" behind Dekker. So all of the pre-race favorites could finish ahead of the domestiques and less stronger climbers.
Good news for Boeing: Colorado scores some points as 16th and Bakari managed to finish the race!
