All teams are already started when the first teams reach the first time checkpoint. Meanwhile, absolutely no wind. Fox Sports sets the first time - already a man down. Unsurprinsingly that time gets cracked by Generali, but the italians might not have their best day. Aeropostal comes close to their time, but the finnish guys beat their time with ease! Wiesenhof quite some time down, but then again Novatek comes close! Finally also the late starters of Vontobel & Flores are within contension, so that we have 6 teams near to each other on the first checkpoint:
The table after 16.1 km in the Zona Carrizalejo shows that this ight be an intense and close fight with some surprising outcome!? To add to that classement, the steepest hill is already done, only one real hill awaiting for us - but the road until the next checkpoint in Valle Campestre is straight flat.
And there Generali comes in with a first good time of 45'56, 57 seconds faster than the Kiwis. But can that be enough? They surely need a lead after their preferred terrain just went through. Well Elta is even behind Fox Sports, and even by a decent margin. Aeropostal as well now half a minute down, and Valio also loses it (24 seconds down). Contrarily Wiesenhof gains time and on is down by a quarter of a minute. We'll have a very interesting run-in to Monterrey I guess!
Novatek and Chiquita are far down the order, while Azteca makes a statement that they desperately want that last place. Flores & Vontobel on par again, but over half a minute down. The reshuffeled classement after checkpoint 2:
Now let's move on to the final timecheck in Monterrey. Can the hill on the final 20 kilometers hurt Generali and prevent them from winning? The italians have a time of 1'09'17 on the finishing line, beating Fox Sports by over a minute. Not too much won on the last part, an indicator of a closer race?
Elta is a threat for neither of those two, but Aeropostal should come second and they do so, 3 quarters of a minute down. Valio even faster, not even half a minute down on Generali, a satisfying performance by the bulls surely! But now it should be all about Generali vs. Wiesenhof. Can the Germans continue their gaining trend?
Yes, but it's not enough. They're lacking 13 seconds to the suspected winner. Novatek really suffered after a strong start and come in current 5th, while the minnions even place themselves behind the kiwis. We better shouldn't mention Azteca, but at least they gained the minor points in a home race they came for.
Now the final teams coming in: Flores ensuring a top 5. while Vontobel fails to do so. Still an on par race for those.
We want to close this race out with a shot of Manuele Boaro taking the trophy for Generali, as he came in first together with Rolland, Beukeboom, van Winden & Viviani. After a shocking start they managed to keep calm and won due to a dominant second sector. Congrats to a win in a race, that went surprisingly on par with the predictions here.
Mexico 
