La Vuelta a España - Stage 10 - Valencia to Castellón *SPOILERS*

Melodeon

Date: Monday 31st August
Type: Rolling/Sprint
Distance: 146.6Km
Start/Finish: Valencia/Castellón


Stage map:



Profile:



First Climb - Puerto del Oronet - Category 3:



Final Climb - Alto del Desierto de las Palmas - Category 2:


Last 5km:



The General Classification after Stage 9:



Preview (© cyclingnews.com):

The sprinters will be eager to bring things back together after a late climb

This is another tricky stage with a rather lumpy aspect. With a rest day and a longish transfer to come, the GC riders should be content to let a break go and have the sprinters’ teams chase it down.

There’s a complication for the latter in the shape of the second-category Alto del Desierto de las Palmas, which comes late in the stage. Averaging five per cent over 8km, it featured on the circuit used for the 2011 Spanish Road Race Championship won by JJ Rojas. Very much in the chasers’ favour, though, are the 20km of pan-flat road that follow it and run all the way into the finish.

The breakaway will need two minutes at the very least if they are to hold on until Castellón.

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gordongekko

Jesus do they never take a rest

Inquitus

Tom Dumoulin

Can't see much happening here GC wise, Degenkolp is the best sprinter left?

neris

gordongekko wrote: »

Jesus do they never take a rest

Think tuesdays a rest day

stecleary

Inquitus wrote: »

Can't see much happening here GC wise, Degenkolp is the best sprinter left?

cant see the sprinters getting a look in here, its too much to ask for with a cat 2 climb peaking 16km from the finish.

A day for the breakaway i think

Darkglasses

Tom Dumoulin

Very hard to pick out any obvious stage winners apart from Degenkolb and Ewan, but even then they aren't exactly nailed on to even be there at the finish. Would people rather an overall winner's poll instead?

stecleary

Darkglasses wrote: »

Very hard to pick out any obvious stage winners apart from Degenkolb and Ewan, but even then they aren't exactly nailed on to even be there at the finish. Would people rather an overall winner's poll instead?

as in GC poll?

Darkglasses

Tom Dumoulin

stecleary wrote: »

as in GC poll?

Yep exactly

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

Darkglasses wrote: »

Yep exactly

Yeah do a poll for who will win GC.

I haven't a clue who I'd pick though :pac:

MPFGLB

Someone mentioned the possibility of cross winds tomorrow. That may liven things up

lethal dose

Tom Dumoulin

Seems hard to see past Froome after yesterday's goings on, maybe he just anticipated the finish better than the others. That in itself shows he's tactics were better and maybe he's a little more prepared each day overall.

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

Froome has 100% of the votes so far!

Darkglasses

Tom Dumoulin

dastardly00 wrote: »

Froome has 100% of the votes so far!

I was a bit torn between him and Aru myself but the ITT is so heavily in Froome's favour.

death1234567

stecleary wrote: »

A day for the breakaway i think

+1. I'll go for some random Caja Rural rider to win.

Pudsy33

death1234567 wrote: »

+1. I'll go for some random Caja Rural rider to win.

I'm on Goncalves

at1withmyself

Rafal Majka

There are 37 riders ahead:
Dario Cataldo,
Matteo Montaguti,
Sergio Henao,
Carlos Verona,
Riccardo Zoidl,
Tiago Machado,
Daniel Navarro,
Peter Velits,
Lawson Craddock,
Rubén Plaza,
Martijn Keizer,
Luis León Sánchez,
Lawrance Warbasse,
Imanol Erviti,
David Arroyo,
Natnael Berhane,
Jurgen Van den Broeck,
Romain Hardy,
Tsgabu Grmay,
Andrey Amador,
Pello Bilbao,
Eduard Vorganov,
Carlos Quintero,
Maxime Monfort,
Ian Boswell,
Salvatore Puccio,
Benjamin King,
Kenny Elissonde,
Stephen Cummings,
Cameron Meyer,
Amael Moinard,
George Bennett,
Darwin Atapuma,
Ángel Madrazo,
Mickael Cherel,
Davide Villella,
Rodolfo Torres.

Johannes Frohlinger, Jérôme Cousin and Jay McCarthy are in pursuit.

The gap with the peloton after 36 km: 2'35.

at1withmyself

Rafal Majka

Henao is a bit of a danger man for the breakaway and with some big names it could stick today as its a short stage, interesting tactics by Sky maybe???

MPFGLB

So many riders makes the breakaway probably stronger than the peloton
Plus some riders in the break are now virtual leaders...Henao ?

Can't imagine Giant can catch all these ?

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

It's going to be interesting to see how this plays out. If the riders in the break manage to work together in some sort of way then they will hold off the peloton.

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

They have a two minute advantage over the platoon according to the Vuelta Twitter feed

D3PO

Tom Dumoulin

wow wasn't expecting this. with 2 Giant guys in the break have they just decided to give up the Malliot Rojo ? I wouldn't want to give Henao too much time if I were the other GC guys ok he cant TT to save his life but hes in decent form going by the Tour of Poland and his Vuelta start.

Not good news for Roche in terms of any hope he had of being given a free role for GC though.

M.J.M.C

http://www.lavuelta.com/la-vuelta/2015/es/directo/aso/

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

Caleb Ewan (Orica - GreenEdge) has abandoned.

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

The gap to the breakaway is tumbling down.

MPFGLB

Seems they are going to race every stage ....great and and madness at the same time

at1withmyself

Rafal Majka

gap down to 1.15 so unless there are a few breaks within the break then they look like getting caught.....

Pudsy33

Break over pretty much, less than a minute now. Giant must have bust a gut chasing it all down. I know it's not meant to be a gc day but you'd wonder if sky have something up their sleeves.

godtabh

Breakaway gone

godtabh

roche down

Pudsy33

godtabh wrote: »

roche down

Bollox.

Edit: he's fine

D3PO

Tom Dumoulin

Nico on the deck for the second day in a row back chasing on with Puccio though hopefully not a bad one.

D3PO

Tom Dumoulin

Movistar drilling it at the front now. No class at all.

godtabh

3 team mates with him

letape

Tom Dumoulin

D3PO wrote: »

Movistar drilling it at the front now. No class at all.

Valverde's instruction no doubt!

godtabh

bike change

MPFGLB

letape wrote: »

Valverde's instruction no doubt!

Looks like Nico is back...must have been energy zapping though

godtabh

two sky riders down. Heano and Kiri

Subpopulus

Kelly: 'Sky rider Hayn-yo'

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

Serious pressure on Degenkolb to win this now.

godtabh

who won that?

godtabh

Sabragali?

Subpopulus

That was a weird sprint.

Inquitus

Tom Dumoulin

I presume Roche is missing from GC due to the bike change?

godtabh

roche gone from top 10.

DDC1990

Inquitus wrote: »

I presume Roche is missing from GC due to the bike change?

Yeah. He was definitely in the peloton.

Darkglasses

Tom Dumoulin

Sbaragli by a hair

pelevin

Would have thought Dumoulin would be more miserly with his reserves than to be closing down breaks there near the end. And then Degenkolb didn't go & get the win!

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

Results and GC have been corrected.
Nico finished in 39th place, same time as the winner.

Inquitus

Tom Dumoulin

Is Stage 11 of the Vuelta the hardest GT Stage ever? with 5200m of climbing in the high mountains topping out at over 2100m and crammed into just 138km of road. Thats an avg gradient for the stage of 3.8% lol!

There's some good info on it here

retalivity

Can always rely on the spanish to provide the insanity for a grand tour.

Giro - bad weather and occassional snow
Tdf - lots of sprints and nice fields
Vuelta - uphill sprints and insanity

dastardly00

Tom Dumoulin

Holy crap godtabh managed to thank my post twice!!! :eek: