Tour d'Andorra
Stage 3
Barcelona is the start town for Stage 3 of the Tour d’Andorra, as the peleton heads from the Catalan capital to the climb of Andorra Arcalis. Andrei Amador showed his class yesterday to attack on the final climb and descend to the finish in Andorra and take the leader’s jersey. Will he hold onto it today, or will it change hands again?
A group of 7 formed the day’s break away, with two major names contained within:
Paulus (+ 41’46 on GC)
Chamorro (+ 2’53 on GC / 2nd in KoM)
Slagter (+ 5’09 on GC / 1st in KoM)
Nareklishvili (+ 58’08 on GC)
Oelerich (+ 1h 31’39 on GC)
Khalifa (+ 1h 04’24 on GC)
Van Niekerk (+1h 13’02 on GC)
It would be
Eritel,
Spotify and
Flores who would take up the early pace, and it seemed UBS were happy for them to do so. Might as well save your domestiques until later in the day, eh!
CRASH MARQUEZ! The incident is caught of camera, but the
Sancor rider, who sits 3rd on GC is down. His teammate
Rodas comes down in the same crash, and 4 other teammates help him back to the peleton via the doctor’s car. He is not looking in a good way…
The break was soon down the three, as Chamorro and Slagter began to play cat and mouse for the KoM points. Missed due to the TV cameras showing us the after mouth of the Marquez crash, Chamorro had taken the Cat.4 KoM sprint, before it would be Slagter would take back some points on the next Cat.3 climb.
Onto the climb of the Cat.1 climb, and the attacks from Chomorro and Slagter had had their effect on the others. Only Paulus left following their wheels, as the likes of Khalifa, Nareklishvili, Van Niekerk and Oelerich drifted back to the peleton and eventually the day’s grupetto.
The battle for KoM supremecy continued at the Cat.1 summit, Chamorro stealing the points this time, and saving an heroics from Slagter, should take the jersey for the day.
This was step one of the heroics… Not willing to give up, Slagter takes the Cat.3 points, reducing the gap to 2 points in the KoM standings.
Over the Cat.3 climb for the peleton, and Marquez is feeling the effects of his crash… Looking in bad shape, he is off the back and struggling on the smallest of climbs. At the end of day, he would lose around 18 minutes to his rivals and go crashing (no pun intended!) down the standings!
Heading towards the lower slopes of Arcalis,
Indosat would be the team setting the pace of the main pack, with around 1’27” remaining between them and KoM searching pair off the front of the group.
Time for those down the standings to try and make up some time!
Meintjes,
Pozzovivo and
Preidler make a move off the front, with UBS now taking up the pace behind. They trio would bridge to the Chamorro/Slagter group, and also bring across
Moschella with them.
I don’t think Slagter actually liked the company, and would this be step 2 of his heroics to take the KoM jersey from today’s stage. With 30km remaining, he goes off on his own…
UBS, with
Amador sat nicely at the front, continue to control things behind and have no worries pulling back any remaining threat off the front. Slagter rolls through the Intermediate Sprint for the points, with Pozzovivo and Moschella picking up some bonus seconds before being caught.
ATTACK BRAJKOVIC! The
Novatek rider sees a change to break clear with the peleton’s pace dropping again. It might be the early slopes of the Arcalis, but this could be a great time to go!
Denifl and
Intxausti are in chase behind, as the other GC favourites organize their attack. Brakjovic has done damage, and it was soon clear to see the wreckage on the mountain side.
5km to go, and the lead trio has around 44” over Amador, who was chasing behind with
Úran. Further 9” behind them, was
Monsalve with
Valls for company, with
Machado and
Berhane another 26” down the road from that group.
Just over 1km to go, and Denifl makes his move for the victory. He tried this on Stage 1 to no effect, but it is looking much more serious today… Intxausti is the only one able to follow, as Brajkovic struggles to hold the wheel.
The pair come to the sprint, and it looks like Intxausti has the upper hand on the Austrian rider! Leading out the sprint, and going early might hurt his chances, but Denifl has no response…
VICTORY INXTAUSTI! The Indosat rider holds his speed and takes a great win on Stage 3. The early move from Denifl comes to nothing again and he has to settle for 2nd here on the day.
A tiring Janez Brajkovic just holds onto 3rd place ahead of a fast-approaching Andrei Amador, who keeps Yellow and the GC lead. Uran takes 5th place, and is harshly given a 6” gap between him and Amador on the line. Certainly didn’t look like it on TV screens…
Monsalve crosses the line in 6th 28” down on Uran, and ahead of Valls, who continues to finish consistently in the Top 10 and without really having to show his face at the front of the peleton.
Nazaret takes 8th, with Berhane and Machado for company in 9th and 10th. The latter is looking a shadow of the rider seen on stage 1, where he took a great win, and the Porto rider would lose another minute to Amador here.
Contador,
Talansky and
Ji all finish over 2 minutes after stage winner Intxausti, whilst Pozzovivo will lose another 4 minutes on GC.
Duarte will also drop down the standings, coming home with a small group + 5’10.
