Sunny weather and light winds, it’s the best you could hope for when taking on a mountain like that one we’ll see today. Plenty of riders line up with a victory as their goal today so hopefully we see a good race.
Plenty of riders want to join the break today so the first 30 kilometres are ridden quickly, now the race settles down with five riders in the break who are Clarke, Santambrogio, Njoroge, Navarro and Benito.
RBC also sent Brown to join the break so they didn’t have to chase but he is struggling to catch this group and is in no-man’s land between the two groups and struggling to close the gap.
The break starts the final climb, with a 2 minute gap on the peloton and 35 kilometres remaining. Brown has also joined this group after over 30 kilometres on his own.
The peloton catches the break with 28 kilometres to go, Mobil Aeropostal controls the pace.
25 kilometres left, Intxausti decides to set the pace despite Mobil’s work and 15 riders split off the front of the group, including himself, Sella, Marquez, Jaramillo, Moschella, Rujano, Brajkovic, Keizer, Raisin, Van den Broeck, Pantano Gómez, Nerz, Panayotov, Nazaret and Eastman.
Quite a few outsiders for victory today miss the split, including Antón, Kiserlovski, Talansky, Samwel and Cataldo.
The peloton comes back together before splitting again, with 19 riders in the lead bunch with 20 kilometres to go, Ardila Cano, Talansky, Antón and Cataldo have joined the riders mentioned earlier. They now begin the easier section of the climb.
15 kilometres left, several riders were taking advantage of the flatter slopes to get some water, but Sella uses this as an opportunity to attack! Van den Broeck, Intxausti, Keizer, Brajkovic, Rujano, Nazaret, Cataldo, Eastman and Marquez follow him, Nerz and Ardila Cano manage to pull the two groups back together, but the hostilities have begun now.
Rujano takes this opportunity to attack! There are 7 kilometres to go but he wants to get away. He gets caught quickly but his attack drops eights riders, including Talansky, Ardila Cano, Panayotov, Pantano Gómez, Raisin, Moschella and Jaramillo can no longer keep up.
Rujano goes again, and finally gets away! Intxausti and Sella are with him, the group behind begins to organise a chase, although the acceleration has dropped Nazaret.
They pass under the 5 kilometres banner with a 25 second lead on those behind, who are led by Keizer. The gap is steady at the moment, not really increasing or decreasing.
2km to go! Sella is beginning to struggle, as Rujano and Intxausti increase the pace side-by-side and refusing to give the other any ground. Behind the chase is whittled down to just 5 riders, Van den Broeck, Keizer, Marquez, Brajkovic and Eastman, and they are still within 30 seconds.
The flamme rouge, the final kilometre, Rujano leads the sprint, Intxausti follows him. Sella is struggling, behind Brajkovic leads the chase, which Nerz has caught, they might still be able to race for third if Sella collapses.
500 metres left, Rujano leads, but Intxausti is moving faster! Further back Brajkovic is on Sella’s wheel, but Sella is putting up a fight for third. With Marquez and Eastman also trying to move past.
An Intxausti takes the win! Rujano had nothing left and has to settle for second. Behind Brajkovic and Marquez go right to the line for third, which Brajkovic takes and Sella holds on for fifth. Eastman, Keizer, Van den Broeck and Nerz are the next four through in the group, while Cataldo beats Nazaret to complete the top ten.
