The queen stage in Eritrea, which is likely to be crucial for the GC: half of today's 115km go uphill, even though only the final km do actually feature slopes up to 11%.
Anyway, the best climbers like Intxausti, Marquez, Kiserlovski, Nazaret and Eastman won't care much about the slopes, but more about the less flat and many many climbing kilometres today!
Today's first action is one for the sprinters though, who battle for some points towards the sprint competition:
Sonnery with a marginal win over Granjel Cabrera and Giaux..
Several tries to break away from the bunch would end empty-handed, except of Bartl, who would go for a long solo-attempt!
52km before finish, four more riders attack the bunch in order the bridge the 2-minutes-gap on Bartl:
Azanza, Dyadichkin, Biziyaremye and Niyonshuti! So the mid-level climbers try their luck with an early attack!
The group would catch up to Bartl soon, but the peloton would also switch to full-chasing mode. This race is in control of the top-teams so far:
just 9km remaining and the escapees are finally swallowed by the bunch.. a perfect scenario for the top-favorites to battle against each other..
..you may expect, he? But the truth is: we see no more serious attempt for the next minutes and we now already enter the final 4km of this stage:
40 riders remain in the leading group with Repsol and Bacardi setting the pace at the very front.. the GC-contenders keep shadowing each other, it seems. When will we finally see some action?
1.7km before finish, finally! Marquez launches his move, this may be the very last chance to actually create some gaps here..
It ain't looking too bad for him, as he actually established a small gap quickly.. more favorites try to jump behind though:
Kiserlovski, followed by Nazaret and Intxausti, yet 16" behind Marquez..
A few metres behind, also Berhane, Samwel, Eastman and Nerz are on the move!
It's only Kiserlovski, who bridges the gap to Marquez with now 800metres remaining!
Intxausti 25" in arrears at this point, while he's yet holding off the other attackers..
For a few moments, it looked like Kiserlovski would easily drop Marquez.. but the Spaniard now counters another acceleration, the two are head-to-head with 600metres to go!
+ 18" for Intxausti
+ 40" for Nazaret, Samwel, Eastman, Nerz, Berhane
+ 1'20" for 31 riders including Efimkin, Schwab, Stetina, Augustyn, Gerdemann, Serpa
Group Nazaret/Eastman desperately tries to hang on, but the gap is growing, as also Intxausti looks like he may catch up to Marquez!
Berhane now struggles to keep Nazaret's pace in the first chasing group, while Eastman and Nerz seem to go for a late attack now!
Marquez with a small advantage again... Intxausti looks a bit too far behind to join this duel for the win...
Marquez holds on to this advantage to take out this second stage ahead of Kiserlovski! A deserved win, as he was the first of all favorites to kick off the action late into the climb.
+ 14" Intxausti, who might have kicked too late. At least there's a clear gap behind him..
+ 44" Nerz and Eastman! The two did well with their late attack on Nazaret... Nerz will gladly take that 4th.
+ 1'03" Nazaret and Samwel, who both might have hoped for a better result today.
+ 1'23" Berhane as 8th. Not yet extraordinary, but well within his possibilities.
+ 1'42" for a next group of 11 riders like Serpa, Maillet, Torres, Efimkin, Stetina and Schwab
Losing more than two minutes: Augustyn, Gerdemann and Elissonde...
Also worth a mention: Bennett was the only to rider to not make the time-limit today! Bad news for the local team, as Bennett could have been a real threat for tomorrow's flat stage. We haven't noticed any crash, so just might have been out of shape today.
So Marquez with the race-lead prior to tomorrow's flat stage. The concluding hilly stage will offer another chance for those, who did lose some seconds/minutes today, so this GC is everything but sealed. Stay tuned.
Final Results Stage 2/*
*unfortunatelly the game refused to export the results, so it's just parts of the complete rankings here
