Not known as a pure sprinter, Jasper Stuyven impressed in the first road stage of his first grand tour when he sprinted to fourth in the bunch kick. Being excellently supported by Yaroslav Popovych and Fabian Cancellara, the young Belgian narrowly missed the podium in his first sprint at the highest level.

You may not know that Jasper Stuyven is in his first WorldTour season – or starting his first ever Grand Tour race - after his fourth place in the sprint finale of the 174-kilometer second stage at the Vuelta a España Sunday.  The 22-year-old Belgian neopro normally plays the role of domestique, either in the Classics riding in support of Fabian Cancellara, or in the lead out for sprinters Danny van Poppel or Giacomo Nizzolo.

But in the Vuelta he has the opportunity to sprint for himself. Today, with help from Fabian Cancellera and Yaroslav Popovych in the windy run-in of the predominantly flat stage, he showed prowess beyond his years, bumping elbows in the hectic sprint finale to finish a respectable fourth place. 

“I think we have begun the Vuelta very well," sports director Josu Larrazabal said. "Our idea is to take every stage like a one-day race with different goals each day and today was a day for Jasper. Of course we don’t put any pressure on him, it’s his first season at the WorldTour level. Even though he has the potential he needs to learn. But like always this season he showed that he is a guy that is really, really fast.

"It was not easy to get [to the finish] because we passed 10kms to go and it was really open area close to the sea and very windy so it was hard to keep the position. Fabian and Popo especially helped him, and once he was there he did very well to manage the situation with the strong sprinters in the peloton.

"Of course Jasper is happy, but I think we are showing more excitement than him because he is always calm. But it is what we want from him and I think he understands this and he is going very well.”

“This is my first Grand Tour," Stuyven said. "I’m just happy with my first result but it’s nothing special yet.”

Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ.fr) won the mass bunch sprint ahead of John Degenkolb (Giant-Shimano) and Roberto Ferrari (Lampre-Merida). There were no significant changes in the overall classification other than Alejandro Valverde assuming the leader’s jersey from his Movistar teammate Jonathan Castroviejo.

The unfortunate news out of the second stage was the crash of Fabio Felline. He did remount and finish and will be ready to go again tomorrow, but two straight days hitting the ground has left him battered and bruised.

“It was bad luck for Felline, he was giving out bottles to the guys and he gave a bottle to Haimar, and was giving a second bottle to Fabian and just in that moment when he only had one hand on the handlebar he hit a hole on the road and lost control and crashed," Larrazabal said. "It was not so bad, like always it could have been worse in this type of crash, so I think, same as yesterday, we need to be glad that he is okay. He is young and he will come back.

"Tomorrow is a good day for Felline, but we know the crash may affect him a little so we shall see how it goes. Of course, like always, we will try. I think from what we saw today it suggests in the coming days that we will do fairly well.”