Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) showed that he has arrived at the Vuelta a Espana with an amazing condition when he took a very impressive victory in the first mountain stage of the race. Having worked for Nairo Quintana all the way up the final climb, he still had enough left in the tank to respond to all attacks before beating Chris Froome (Sky) and Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) in a sprint to take both the stage win and the overall lead.

 

A few days ago Alejandro Valverde performed pretty poorly in stage 3 of the Vuelta a Espanawhich had led to speculation that the Spaniard was not at 100% of his capabilities. Today he put all doubt to rest by delivering a dominant showing in the first mountain stage of the race to take both the stage win and reclaim the leader’s jersey.

 

Apparently, Movistar also had some concerns as they clearly decided to support Nairo Quintana in today’s stage. When the pace briefly went down on the final climb, Valverde moved to the front to set up his Colombian teammate for the stage win and a stint in the red jersey.

 

Valverde rode hard on the front for most of the climbs while the overall contenders gradually dropped off. Passing the flamme rouge, only Quintana, Chris Froome, Alberto Contador, Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha), Fabio Aru (Astana), Johan Esteban Chaves (Orica-GreenEDGE), Mikel Nieve (Sky) and Daniel Navarro (Cofidis) had been able to hang onto his wheel while lots of riders had seen their GC hopes being dealt a heavy blow.

 

Everybody was waiting for Rodriguez to launch his trademark attack and the Katusha leader made his move with 500m to go. However, Valverde showed impressive strength by bridging the gap while Froome, Contador and Quintana set off in pursuit.

 

Hard work by the Sky captain brought them back in contention which briefly caused the pace to go down. Nonetheless, it was too fast for Quintana who lost contact with the leaders.

 

With 100m to go, Valverde still had something left and he launched  a fierce sprint that quickly saw him get an advantage. Even though Froome got very close in the end – with Contador glued to his wheel – the Spaniard held on to take the win.

 

Rodriguez lost contact in the finale and rolled across the line with a time loss of 8 seconds while Quintana lost another 4 seconds in 5th.

 

The big winner was Valverde who also reclaimed the leader’s jersey after Michael Matthews had been unable to stay in contact on the climb. He now goes into the 7th stage with a 15-second advantage over Quintana. He faces an undulating day in the saddle as the riders will tackle two categorized climbs in some rolling terrain that includes a gradual 15km ascent to the finish.

 

The first mountain stage

After 5 easier days, it was finally time for the GC riders to show their cards in stage 6 which brought them into the Andalucian mountains in a 167.1km run from Benalmadena to a mountaintop finish in La Zubia. After a flat first half long the coast, the riders hit along category 2 climb that preceded some rolling terrain and a category 3 ascent. Then it was flat until the riders hit the bottom of the short but very steep climb to the finish.

 

All riders who started the race last Saturday again took the start in very hot conditions. Sebastien Turgot got his race off on a bad not as he suffered a minor crash in the neutral zone.

 

The break is formed

Right from the beginning, KOM leader Lluis Mas (Caja Rural) and yesterday’s lone escapee Pim Ligthart (Lotto Belisol) launched an attack and they were immediately given some leeway. When they were 1 minute ahead, Johan Le Bon (FDJ) and Peter Sagan (Cannondale) tried to bridge the gap and later Jimmy Engoulvent (Europcar), Elia Favilli (Lampre-Merida), Simon Clarke (Orica-GreenEDGE) and Daniel Teklehaimanot (MTN-Qhubeka) also tried their hand.

 

Those attempts were all futile and now the peloton decided to take it easy. After 20km of racing, the escapees were 3 minutes ahead and 10km further up the road, they had extended their advantage to 7 minutes.

 

A massive gap

After the first hour of racing, the gap was a massive 9.40 and at the 50km mark, it had even reached 14.20. This prompted Garmin-Sharp to react as they wanted to win the stage with Dan Martin and they started to bring the advantage down.

 

At the bottom of the first climb, the escapees were 12 minutes ahead and when Mas led Ligthart over the top, they still had the same amount of time in hand. Then the peloton accelerated slightly and the latest time check is 10.40.

 

Katusha lend a hand

Katusha now also started to contribute to the work, with Dmitriy Kozontcuk swapping turns with Nate Brown and Johan Vansummeren. As a consequence, the gap came down but with 60km to, the Russian team again stepped back.

 

Vansummeren and Brown led the peloton on the lower slopes of the next climb before the former blew up and left it to Nathan Haas to make his contribution. When Mas led Ligthart across the line at the top, the gap had come down to 7.45.

 

Katusha kick back into action

With 40km to go, Katusha decided that it was again time to kick into action and they hit the front hard with Kozontchuk, Eduard Vorganov and Sergei Chernetskii. Soon after, the former started to trade pulls with Brown and Haas and the gap was now melting away.

 

With 25km to go, the escapees were still 5 minutes ahead and the fight for position had now really started. Ligthart led Mas across the line in the intermediate sprint while John Degenkolb (Giant) sprinted ahead to pick up the final point on offer.

 

Degenkolb scores points

Katusha briefly stopped their work as Rodriguez had a mishap but now Orica-GreenEDGE had taken over. Mitch Docker, Brett Lancaster and Sam Bewley set a brutal pace and when Ligthart beat Mas in the final intermediate sprint, the gap was less than 3 minutes.

 

Degenkolb again picked up the final point on offer while Cameron Meyer and Ivan Santaromita were now riding on the front Orica. Eduard Vorganov took a brief turn for Katusha before Daniele Bennati (Tinkoff) took over to position Contador.

 

Ligthart the lone leader

Matthews took a huge turn before leaving room for Peter Kennaugh (Sky) to lead the peloton onto the climb. The escapees were only 30 seconds ahead and Ligthart launched an immediate attack.

 

As they hit the steep part, Mas was dropped and now Jonathan Castroviejo was setting the pace for Movistar. While Mas was brought back, Christophe Le Mevel (Cofidis) attacked.

 

Evans is dropped

Pieter Serry (OPQS) and Alberto Losada (Katusha) both took turns on the front and with 3km to go, Le Mevel and Ligthart had both been brought back.

 

As Losada continued to set the pace, the first GC riders started to lose contact, with Haimar Zubeldia and Cadel Evans being among the first victims.

 

Talansky takes over

With 2km to go Andrew Talansky took over and his pace sent Wilco Kelderman (Belkin) out the back door. George Bennett launched an attack but was quickly brought back.

 

When Talansky swung off, the pace went down and this is where Valverde came into play. The Spaniard started to ride hard on the front and under the red kite, only 9 riders were left, setting the scene for the exciting finale.