Alberto Contador tried to extend his lead over Alejandro Valverde in today's queen stage of the Vuelta al Pais Vasco but the Movistar leader responded to all his attacks. The race leader regretted the strong headwind that had made it impossible to make a difference and had also hoped that Valverde would have helped take more time on Michal Kwiatkowski ahead of the time trial.

Another mountainous stage in Vuelta a Pais Vasco saw attacks from Alberto Contador who retained his overall lead. Dutchman Wouter Poels took the stage win.   
 
It was a tough stage 4 in Vuelta a Pais Vasco, where the riders had to tackle three category 2 climbs and 2 category 1 climbs – the last one peaking just a few kilometers from the finish line.
 
The stage started with a frantic pace and when the riders arrived at the penultimate climb, the peloton was down to 50 riders. On the last climb, Tinkoff-Saxo naturally sat the tempo further reducing the size of the peloton. Roman Kreuziger moved to the front on the last climb and held the rivals of team leader Alberto Contador in a tight grip making sure that eager attacks was kept to a minimum.
 
With just a couple of kilometers to go of the final climb, Alberto Contador decided to open the stage himself by deploying a series of accelerations and attacks on the remaining favorites.
 
However Alejandro Valverde – the main contender of Tinkoff-Saxo’s Spanish captain – responded quickly and followed every attack from Contador. But it was only in the last few corners of the technical descent down to the finish line that Valverde made his move trying to secure a few seconds on Contador. He succeeded in gaining two seconds due to a small gap in the group of the favorites. But Valverde was unable to catch Omega Pharma – QuickStep’s Wouter Poels who took the win just in front of the Movistar rider.

 
"Today was a hard and fast stage here in Vuelta a Pais Vasco," Contador said. We went 52 km/h in the first hour of the race. Thanks to the team, they did a great job showing impressive strength. Tomorrow there will certainly be more to come.

“It would have been better not to lose time to Alejandro, but inthe end the group has split. It was a very different climb than other times. I think it has been much slower and there was a very strong headwind that I don't remember from past editions. I saw it from the start I've seen but I found a right curve that could be used to attack. The truth is that the group could easily take the wheel.

“I realized that some dangerous riders were in trouble and I told Alejandro to go ahead, but he has preferred to stay on my wheel and so I tried to set a steady tempo, also protecting myself a bit because I thought he was going to attack. In some way, I'm very happy, especially for the team that has controlled the stage in an incredible way because it has been crazy from the start. Now the objective is to recover
as well as possible.

“I saw that Kwiatkowski was in difficulty and as he is doing some extraordinary time trials, any advantage you may have on him, is great
and some of the BMC riders were also in trouble. But it has been difficult to make differences because the headwind was very strong and rthe riders could easily follow wheels.

“Alejandro is doing some very good time trial, especially in one like the one on Saturday, but it’s not bad to me either. It will depend on the strength of each rider, how we recover, and we must also not forget forget that we have riders behind us who are really good in time trials.

"It will be a time trial in which will reflect the condition of everyone. For me the most important thing is to recover well and we’ll see what happens. 12 seconds over Alejandro is not much, but I'd rather have him behind me than ahead of me.

“There are very few stages of transition. Tomorrow will be a pretty busy day, like today, and it will be really hard. I'm sure many riders are going to feel it, maybe also me. We also have to see how the weather is, because there may be
rain and that always makes the race a little crazy and gives moreopportunities for everyone."

 
DS Philippe Mauduit believes that tomorrow will be another hard fought stage since Valverde and the rest of the favorites need to gain on Alberto Contador before the hilly time trial Saturday – a time trial that also concludes this year’s Pais Vasco.
 
"Today we had a strong headwind on the last climb," he said. "Maybe that’s why Alejandro waited for the descent to attack. So we will definitely see more attacks tomorrow. Alejandro Valverde needs to attack if he wants to go for the overall victory. So the boys are ready to control and help Alberto has much as possible."