Welcome to the first race of the Spanish Crit Series: La Rambla.
It´s taking place in the city of Barcelona and is mainly flat on a 54km route.
Favourites are the sprinters and here we have interesting riders from all countries. Drujon for the French fans, Santos for the Portuguese, Cucinotta/Capecchi for the Italians and lots of Spaniards like Anton Martin or Lay.
But as the crit series has shown so far, the puncheurs will always give it a try on these stages as well to fight for the overall already.
So also today. Two good hilly riders try it just after the start.
First is CSC`s Barrio followed by Iberia`s Toribio. Both might also be in front at the harder stages.
10km later Kappa`s Failli joins them making it 3 puncheurs already.
And another few kilometers later Livramento (Benfica) completes the breakaway.
Those 4 riders already have a gap of 2'36 with 36km to go.
A bit surprising that the home team FC Barcelona wasn`t sending a rider as well as their sprint chances are not the best here and this would have been a good chance for them to show their jersey.
3 teams do the main work behind.
Team France for Drujon, Alstom-RBC for Soupe and Pearl Adidas for one of their sprinters (Delage, Mondory, Fonseca).
With 14km to go and a gap of just 1min some more riders try to attack and this time a Barcelona rider in there as well with Florencio.
The others are a bit surprisingly Petit (Evian), Tendero (Kelme) and Aramendia for the Spanish National Team.
No question that the crowd is becoming loud now coming towards the final.
7,6km to go and still 50s for them.
And it`s a quintett now as Aramendia was the only rider being able to bridge that gap, while all the other late attackers are caught again.
When they continue to work together this might be a chance to beat the sprinters.
5km left and as the gap is still at almost 1min we see another attack.
One of Pearl`s sprinters in Delage is trying it.
Alstom`s Mangel is following him.
But also the French National team is improving their speed again.
In especially Delage in the breakaway now doesn`t help their chances a lot as the other riders won`t work for him here and so the speed drops a bit and the sprinters see their chances again.
Just one sprint train, which is not in the favour of several sprinters, who find themselves with several meters back here.
Racault and Cousin are the last riders ahead of Drujon, who is in a perfect position obviously.
Behin him Santos and Aberasturi have won the fight for the better positions while Teruel, Lay, Petit, Anton Martin, Silvestre, Lasca, Sonnery, Fonseca, Cardoso, Capecchi, Cucinotta and Cano hang behind them in this order, which is not that ideal seeing that there is already a 20m difference between those sprinters.
Cousin is going strong with 2,3km to go and has reached the first breakaway riders, where Delage surely is the strongest and having a good gap already.
Did the sprinters waited too long? With 1km to go Aberasturi is the first in the wind while Delage still has a bit of a gap.
Santos is following him immediately while Drujon waited a bit longer but also goes now.
Only 300m left and Delage is struggling. Santos and Lay are accelerating but still need to close the gap to Aberasturi first.
Behind the fight for the last top10 spots probably with all the bad placed sprinters.
On the last 100m Delage is caught by Aberasturi. But the fight for the win is not decided yet as Drujon, Santos and Lay are all coming fast from behind, while Aberasturi feels the pain of being in the wind early.
Aberasturi just made it to the line to win the opening stage.
Would it have been 20cm more he would have lost it to Drujon (2nd) and Lay (3rd). What a close finish.
Santos probably had hoped for more than the 4th, while Delage is rewarded with the 5th at least after his long sprint.
Capecchi, Anton Martin, Lascam Teruel and Petit to win the top10 fight of the rest.
Jon Aberasturi
Mathieu Drujon
Bruno Santos
Eros Capecchi
