After two days for the sprinters, the Tour de San Luis will continue with the first of two hilly stages. Both will feature hilltop-finishes, so may become crucial for all who aim for the GC.
Plenty of decent puncheurs or allrounders at the start, so hard to pick a favorite: Godoy, Rosskopf, Beltran, Sayar or Paulinho may be considered as possible top-bets though.
But first, the race still gives the sprinters a chance to deliver. As Azteca went for a rather high pace right from the start, there's no breakaway attempt until the first Intermediate Sprint 13km into the race.
And so it's quite weird to see race-leader JJ Haedo not even trying to sprint for a few more points and bonus seconds:
Sprint #1
LS Haedo
Sepulveda
Drapac
So yesterday's stage-winner Drapac collects 2 points (39 in total) to narrow the gap to points-leader Haedo (41)..
Only a few moments later, 3 riders attacked the bunch and are allowed to go for the first breakaway attempt:
Affonso, Devine and Vosekalns (all lost minutes in the opening stages)
The escapees established a gap up to 4 minutes as they now cross today's toughest climb halfway through the race (64km to go). Devine was dropped by his companions already on the first KoM-sprint, so it's just a leading duo in the meantime:
KoM #1 (Cat3)
Affonso
Vosekalns
Devine
KoM #2 (Cat1)
Affonso
Vosekalns
Montenegro
The duo also takes out the second Intermediate Sprint, while the gap on the bunch is down to 1'25" (42km remaining) in the meantime.. and this time, JJ Haedo goes for his 2 bonus seconds and points:
Sprint #2
Affonso
Vosekalns
JJ Haedo
It's now a rather long flat profile before the riders will reach the finish climb, but the action is on, as we see the first serious attempts back in the bunch (which is down to 97 riders after the climb - GC's 2nd Drapac got dropped, which ain't exactly surprising):
Sequera makes his move with 37km to go!
4 riders jump behind immediately and while it ain't the biggest GC-contenders, it's still a group with some possible threats for today's stage at least:
Parisien Hasanovic Arredondo Di Gregorio
22km to go and the leading duo holds on to a 50"-gap. You may notice that the latest attackers couldn't open up a gap on the now full chasing bunch. So it's again the duo versus the peloton - for now..
This changes 15km before finish, where another rider launches an attack trying to escape from the bunch:
Valencia goes!
He managed to establish a 30"-gap on the peloton quickly and two riders followed his move to make for a maybe more dangerous group than we've seen before:
Fumic and Safarzadeh catch up to Valencia 10km before finish. None of them lost time on the flat stages, opposing to the still leading two escapees.
The chasing group worked well together and finally catches up to the leading duo with now only 4km and the finish climb to go!
No more attacks in the meantime, so that's why we're already on today's crucial sector now. The bunch struggles to narrow the gap, which is at 50"!
And of course some GC-favorites have to do something today, especially with a possible threat in Valencia in particular:
Godoy attacked the pack first, with Beltran jumping behind quickly!
Some more favorites like Rudaskov or Castano show themselves at the front of the peloton, with the first actually trying to follow Godoy.
Not only Rudaskov, but also Castano did so and the two join Godoy/Beltran a few seconds later. With 3km to go, the new chasing group is still 45" behind the escaping group, but also 20" in front of the bunch.
But group Castano/Godoy won't work together and so the peloton (still 94 riders) catches up again! In the meantime, the leading group is reduced to 4 rides, as Affonso can't follow the pace anymore. 2km to go for this leading group.
And it's looking very good for this group, which still holds on to a minute's advantage on the big bunch with now 1.2km remaining!
Valencia and Fumic attack the group and open up a 17"-gap!
Early escapee Vosekalns still does well though, accompanied by late-attacking Safarzadeh.
It may be too late for the stage-win, but some GC-favorites now give it another try to at least create some crucial gaps:
Beltran went first, now catching up to Affonso and establishing a small gap on
Castano! A few metres behind Rudaskov and Godoy. 15"-gaps each.
Almost the same situation with less than 1000 metres to go for the leading duo, where Valencia seems to open up a gap on Fumic though:
Valencia's teammate Beltran appears to be the strongest of the top-favorites and shows a really impressive kick here. With 500 metres remaining, he catches up to the 2nd group, which is 27" behind the leading duo!
It's quite a gap between Beltran and those, who tried to follow his move! Let's have a look at the situation with only a few hundred metres to go for the leading duo:
E1
E2 (0.28)
E3 (1.18)
P (1.46)
Valencia
Safarzadeh
Castano
De Greef
Fumic
Beltran
Godoy
Sayar
Vosekalns
Affonso
Rosskopf
Rudaskov
Paulinho
Ibanez
Nicacio
McConvey
Schwab
Rodas
JJ Haedo
Lammertink
and more
Kulhavy
And those gaps were obviously too huge for anyone to catch up to the leading duo, where Valencia celebrates a great stage-win ahead of Fumic!
Well played by Nutresa, which send Valencia on the attack with more than 10km to go. With quite some gaps today, this may be valuable seconds for both him and Fumic.
27" later Safarzadeh fights his way to the final podium spot, followed by an impressive Beltran, who was by far the strongest of all top-favorites. Like said before, this is definitely a huge stage for Nutresa.
Also Vosekalns showed a huge fight to finish 5th with 48" in arrears and those KoM-points will make him and Affonso take the shared KoM-lead today!
1'10" behind Valencia, a duo Castano and Godoy managed to gain 13 seconds on the following group with some more GC-contenders:
Rudaskov, Rodas or McConvey as maybe the most promising in this 7-men-group.
Schwab crosses the line 1'47" behind Valencia to complete the Top-15, with a bigger group with some GC-contenders 8 seconds behind:
Sayar, De Greef, Kasa, Ferrari, Paulinho/Nicacio or Rosskopf as the most notable names here. A more or less disastrous day for Rosskopf in particular, given that he was expected to be one of the stronger favorites today.
Anyway, the GC is mixed up a lot - as expected: it's almost the same order as today's stage result, so Valencia slips into the leader's shirt. Still at least three crucial stages to come though.
