La Vuelta Stage 18: Requena -Gandia 200.6km

Daroxtar

From Cyclingquotes- http://www.cyclingquotes.com/news/2016_vuelta_a_espana_stage_18_preview/

Quintana showed no signs of weakness of Alto Mas de la Costa and now just needs to limit his losses in the time trial and defend himself on the Alto de Aitana to take his second grand tour win. Before he gets to the next GC test, he needs to get safely through the lumpy stage 18 which offers the sprinters a rare chance to go for glory if they can control things in what will be a hard opening part.

The course
The second week was one long series of frustrations for the sprinters but the fast finishers will have had an incentive to make it to the final part of the race. Three of the final six stages should be for the fastmen and after they had their first opportunity in stage 16, they could get another chance just three days before the big finale in Madrid.

At 200.6km, stage 18 is the second longest of the race and it will bring the riders from Requena to Gandia. In the first part, they will travel south along lumpy roads that never become completely flat and then they will tackle the category 2 climb of Puerto de Casa del Alto (13.3km, 3.8%). After the top, they will continue south along hilly roads until a long descent leads to the 105km mark.

The riders will now head in a northeasterly direction for the final part of the stage and even though the roads aren’t completely flat, the terrain is easy. After a gradual uphill section, the final 65km are mainly descending. Along the way, the riders will contest the intermediate sprint at the 147km mark. The gradual downhill will continue all the way to the finish in the coastal town of Gandia until it flattens out for the final 4km. The riders will turn left in a roundabout with 1400m to go and then go straight through a roundabout at the flamme rouge. Finally, there’s a right-hand turn in a roundabout with 600m to go.

Gandia has not hosted the finish of a major bike race for more than a decade.

neris

day for the breakaway though sky might might try do some thing to claw back a bit of time going into the TT tomorrow for Froome

retalivity

Rolland in a breakaway on a flattish stage. How his stock has fallen.

neris

retalivity wrote: »

Rolland in a breakaway on a flattish stage. How his stock has fallen.

must be the 1st time cannondale have gotten into the breakaway this vuelta

Macy0161

neris wrote: »

must be the 1st time cannondale have gotten into the breakaway this vuelta

I would've said Rolland has been in a few, he just hasn't lasted the pace until the pointy end. Sad to see what that team has become!

neris

Macy0161 wrote: »

I would've said Rolland has been in a few, he just hasn't lasted the pace until the pointy end. Sad to see what that team has become!

probably just aswell for his own sake that dan martin got out of there for this year though he probably should have gone year or 2 earlier. was something said about them last night on teh itv highlights to david millar and he just threw his eyes up towards the ceiling mumbled something and moved on to talk about some other rider

Decuc500

Macy0161 wrote: »

Sad to see what that team has become!

And yet they have 2 men in the top 10 overall. Talansky has barely been mentioned on Eurosport's commentary yet he keeps slowly moving up the leaderboard.

Macy0161

Decuc500 wrote: »

And yet they have 2 men in the top 10 overall. Talansky has barely been mentioned on Eurosport's commentary yet he keeps slowly moving up the leaderboard.

The new Zubeldia! 9 wins last year, 6 so far this year.

pelevin

Looks very likely a sprint finish with as expected no GC action - presumably barring crashes or something very unexpected.

terrydel

Tomoro will decide it

pelevin

Manic sprinting style by Orica's Danish rider Magnus Nielsen wins.