Stage 3 - Sort > Vilanova de Meià The only hilly rated stage of the race and while it does not feature a too challenging finale, the route itself is anything but easy. A few steep climbs throughout the route and also the final kilometres may offer chances to create some gaps. Yesterday's mountain stage went rather quiet with only GC leader Denifl capable to break clear from a rather big group and he should be amongst the more promising GC contenders again.
A first breakaway attempt of ten riders was shut down quickly: Cheyne, Müller, Grabovski, Solinski, Leezer, Dahlberg, Mottin, C RodrÃguez, Kanepejs and Tivani could not go clear from the pack..
Instead, there's a group of 4 riders going clear with 144km to go, yet establishing a minutes gap quickly:
And look, who's joining them 20km later: Contador is on the attack again, bridging across the 2-minutes-gap with now 125km left. Being 2nd in the KoM classification, his intention is pretty clear.
Unfortunatelly for him, he looks already quite exhausted after his efforts to join the leading group and as soon as the riders sprint for the first Cat3 mountain, he's already being dropped..
Leezer takes the first mountain sprint ahead of RodrÃguez and Contador will find himself back in the peloton soon!
RodrÃguez takes the next two climbs (Cat1 and Cat3):
Vuillermoz is the next rider being dropped from the leading group and with now 46km to go in the stage, the gap to the peloton is already down to just a minute. The pace is in the pack is quite high with the first wave of attacks going on:
Howes Fernandez attack on a downhill sector with just 42 seconds to the leading trio
Uchima Zoidl Bennett try to jump behind!
That's the end for the early break already, as the peloton won't let those latest attackers go clear: the higher pace does it's damage and both the early breakaway group and the latest attackers are back in the peloton just a few minutes later. 71 riders in the bunch now and we see some notable names on the wrong side of the first big split:
Nazaret Shikai Brändle are in a group 2'52" behind the main peloton!
Things can only go worse from now on, as we see another attack at the front of the race:
Craddock Uchima Zoidl try to go clear with 37km left in the stage!
It's just another empty handed attempt though, but the attacking goes on with now 26km remaining:
Fernandez Navardauskas Khripta Tvetcov
The peloton is reduced to 62 riders with the pace still at it's peak..
The four latest attackers maintain a small advantage over the pack for a while, but they also struggle to really stay clear. The peloton keeps pacing and some more damage is done:
Borisavljevic is the next notable name being dropped 9.5km before finish! He looks totally empty and just like Shikai or Nazaret, he's likely to lose minutes today..
Shikai is way further behind, in between a big group of 51 riders (group A8)! After yesterday's strong 3rd on the stage (5th in the GC), this is going to be a terrible day for him and he will probably lose all GC ambitiouns as well. He's more than six minutes behind the main group at this point..
Back to the front, where group Khripta/Fernandez/Navardauskas/Tvetcov indeed got swallowed by the peloton (45 riders) soon after they passed the penultimate ascent. Just when it looked like the race would settle down, we have the next attack:
Villella is going clear with now just 3.4km to go! He's quickly opening up a 34 seconds gap!
There's no reaction in the main group this time, but the group (44 riders now) keeps the gap at 32 seconds as they enter the final short climb with now only 1.3km to go:
GC leader Denifl is safely inside this group, while at the very front, we mostly see second-tier climbers/puncheurs:
Choi Parra Bustamente and Sepulveda Bennett Meintjes Nepomnyachsniy Keizer and Augustyn Valls and Penasa Pellaud
Villella is going to win the stage though, as the gap is still big enough with just a few hundred metres to go for the solo leader:
Choi at the front of the main group, at least trying to make up for Shikai's horrible day..
Nepomnyachsniy is the first to accelerate, while Keizer das dropped back now..
There's another split in the group then and we see a few more notable names in troubles:
Novak (4th in the GC) can't keep up with the pace anymore and he's at the front of a 12-men-group, that has lost contact to the main bunch! They are quickly 48 seconds behind with still a kilometre to go!
Panayotov is in this group, too..
..and - surprisingly - Úran! The GC's 2nd ain't looking good at all, fighting at the very back of this group.. this may hurt at the end of the day and he surely must limit the damage somehow..
Villella takes the stage in the meantime! A perfectly timed attack from 3km outside the finish and with him being no serious GC contender anymore, he was allowed to go for line honours then. That must have been the plan when sending him to this race and it's always nice for the team, if this guy delivers a stage-win then. Well done.
The first bigger group comes in at + 0.31 on the stage-winner and it's been a rather "slow" sprint between those guys at the front of the group:
Bennett crosses the line as 2nd! A nice result after losing minutes yesterday..
Choi sprints for 3rd and minor bonifications. Another stage podium for Meiji after Shikai finsihed 3rd yesterday, but his losses today will surely hurt nevertheless. Anyway, Choi is well in contention for a high GC result now!
Valls comes 4th ahead of Meintjes, Pellaud, Penasa, Nepomnyachsniy, Orlov and Bardet. The big GC guys Henao Montoya, Denifl, Keizer and Velits finish safely inside this group..
..opposing to some other names, we've already mentioned:
+ 2'12" for Novak, Panayotov and Úran
Quite a bummer for particularly Úran today. After doing quite well as 2nd yesterday, this was not to be forseen. He must be disappointed and definitely needs to deliver in the timetrial then!
+ 5'19" for a group with Rodrigues
+ 7'22" for a big group with Borisavljevic as the most notable name
+ 9'30" for Nazaret
+ 10'08" for Shikai with a bunch of helpers at his side.. what a terrible day for him and it's hard to say, what went so wrong here. He definitely must have had one of the worst daily shape of his life? Also Brändle in this group, so there won't be any upsetting GC result for one of the best TT guys in the field..
So this will make for some changes in the GC of course:
Denifl retains the leader shirt by 40 seconds Keizer as new 2nd in the GC! Choi moves up to 3rd with a 44 seconds disadvantage. Úran drops to 16th with now 2.16 on Denifl and the pressure to deliver in the key timetrial in two days. Novak down to 18th, Bennett up to 20th and Ndayisenga is the new U25 leader after Borisavljevic's problems today.
