Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) again proved that he has returned to his former level when he won today's hard opening stage of the Vuelta al Pais Vasco in impressive solo fashion. Riding comfortable on the wheel of the Alejandro Valverde when the Movistar captain blew the peloton to pieces on the final steep climb, he made an impressive counterattack to open a 13-second gap over the lone Valverde by the time he reached the finish line in Ordizia.

 

Alberto Contador has proved that he is fully ready to contend for the win at this year's Vuelta al Pais Vasco after putting in an excellent performance in today's hilly first stage of the race. The Tinkoff-Saxo captain came out triumphant in a very exciting duel with an in-form Alejandro Valverde to deal all his rivals a big blow already on the opening day of the race.

 

The hilly stage ended with a tough 2.3km climb whose average gradient of 13% was expected to blow the peloton to pieces and from the top, only 6.7km of mostly fast downhill remained. Fresh off a dominant performance at the GP Miguel Indurain, Valverde beamed with confidence as he put in a strong attack almost from the bottom of the climb.

 

While the main group was now in bits spread all over the road, Contador was the only one to keep up with the strong Movistar leader but Valverde seemed rather convinced that he would not be put into difficulty by the Tinkoff-Saxo rider. In fact, he just continued setting a hard pace without even looking back at his rival.

 

With less than a kilometre to the top, however, Contador did what Valverde had clearly thought to be impossible. He put in one of his trademark attacks and Valverde - clearly on his limit - didn't even try to respond. In a matter of seconds, Contador built up a big gap and when he crested the summit, he was 15 seconds ahead.

 

Behind Valverde was doing his best to limit his losses as he used his excellent descending skills to try to get closer to the race leader but at the finish, he had only reduced his deficit by 1 seconds. Contador took an impressive solo win as he crossed the line 14 seconds ahead of a disappointed Valverde.

 

Behind the duo, Michal Kwiatkowski (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) had initially tried to follow them but as he failed in his quest, he fell back to a chase group that included Cadel Evans (BMC), Damiano Cunego (Lampre), Jean-Christophe Peraud (Ag2r), Mikel Nieve (Sky), and Yury Trofimov (Katusha). The Pole did most of the work to limit his losses before distancing his companions slightly on the uphill finishing straight to take third on the stage.

 

With no time bonuses in the Basque race, Contador takes a 14-second lead over Valverde into tomorrow's second stage. The 155.8km route has a tough start but ends with several kilometres that are not flat but have no categorized climbs and so the stage is expected to give the fast finishers their first chance in the race.

 

A hilly opener

There was no gentle introduction to this year's Vuelta al Pais Vasco as the first stage took place on a very hilly route around the city of Ordizia. During the 153.4km stage, the riders would tackle no less than 8 categorized climbs spread throughout the majority of the course. The final two ascent came inside the final 30k of the race, with the decision being expected to come of the Alto de Gaintza. The 2.3km climb had a brutal average gradient of 13.04% and with its top being located just 6.7km from the line, there would be little chance to come back before the final 500m uphill in Ordizia.

 

The race is infamously known for its massive amounts of rain but today's stage took off under an unusually sunny sky. With the lumpy profile, the stage seemed hard to control and so many riders were eager to be part of the day's breakaway.

 

The break is formed

Fabricio Ferrari (Caja Rural) was one of the most active and when he made his second attack at the 8km mark, he was allowed to go clear. He was joined by Matteo Montaguti (Ag2r), Davide Villella (Cannondale), and Romain Sicard (Europcar) and the quartet started to build up a gap as they peloton finally slowed down.

 

After 17km of racing, they were already 2.15 ahead but as the peloton went a bit harder up the day's first climb, it went down to 2 minutes. After the top, however, the peloton again took it easy, allowing the gap to reach 4.20 at the 27km mark.

 

Movistar work hard

One of the Vanendert brothers tried to bridge the gap and got to within 1.30 of the leaders before he gave up his attempt and fell back to the peloton. Meanwhile, Villella had beaten Montaguti and Sicard into the minor positions at the top of the first climb to move into the virtual lead of the mountains classification.

 

With the gap up to more than 4 minutes, Movistar started to show their intentions of winning the stage with Alejandro Valverde. The Spanish team rode on the front for a long time, keeping the gap stable between the 4- and 5-minute marks.

 

Tinkoff-Saxo show their intentions

Javier Moreno did much of the early work for the Spanish team and he was later joined by Bruno Pires (Tinkoff-Saxo) as the yellow-clad team also started to show their intentions. The dup did a good job to keep the gap stable at around 4.45 during the run-in to the day's fourth climb with 65km to go.

 

When the roads started to point upwards, Movistar decided to up the pace as one of their strongest climbers Jose Herrada hit the front. The Spaniard's fast pace put many riders on their limit and reduced the gap to 2.45 by the time they crested the summit. In the break, Villella again led Montaguti, Sicard and Ferrari over the top.

 

Movistar up the pace

Movistar and Herrada kept the speed high on the descent as they now approached the steep Alto de Gaintza which would feature again so prominently inside the final 10km of the race. Herrada and Ruben Plaza rode hard from the bottom for Movistar as the peloton exploded to pieces.

 

In the break, Montaguti was setting a pace that was too fast for Ferrari and Sicard. Villella was struggling several times but every time he managed to rejoin his companion and so he could again take maximum points at the top.

 

Hernandez sets a fierce pace

On the steepest section, Tinkoff-Saxo wanted to up the pace even further and so they put Jesus Hernandez on the front. The Movistar riders, however, didn't follow him and so he unintentionally opened a gap.

 

Contador was quick to shut it down and so Hernandez led the peloton all the way up the climb, cresting the summit with a 2.05 gap to the leaders.

 

Txurruka takes off

The main group had been whittled down to 30 riders at the top and even though a few more managed to rejoin on the descent, the race was now down to around 50 riders. Hernandez led the peloton down the descent as Philippe Gilbert (BMC) and Jelle Vanendert (Lotto Belisol) made use of the downhill section to open a small gap.

 

As soon as they hit the day's sixth climb, Vanendert fell off the pace while Amets Txurruka (Caja Rural) attacked. He quickly passed Gilbert who - like Vanendert - fell back to the main group. Txurruka caught his teammate Ferrari who took one big turn for him before again getting dropped.

 

Tinkoff-Saxo and Movistar lead the chase

Up ahead, Villella crested the summit in first position while a big push from a spectator allowed Ferrari to rejoin Txurruka. The Caja Rural duo were 1.30 behind at the top while the peloton led by Rory Sutherland (Tinkoff-Saxo) was 10 seconds further adrift.

 

Txurruka and Ferrari were caught on the descent as Tinkoff-Saxo continued their hard riding. Hitting the flat section in the valley, Movistar joined them as Hernandez and Ion Izagirre set the pace all the way to the bottom of the penultimate climb, catching Sicard in the process.

 

Zubeldia drops off

As the battle for position intensified, the gap was down to just 30 seconds and so Villella and Montaguti decided to wait for the main group. As soon as they hit the lower slopes of the climb, Izagirre fell off the pace - as did Haimar Zubeldia (Trek) - and so the work was left to Hernandez.

 

Movistar moved to the front with Herrada again upping the pace and several riders started to struggle at the back. As they crested the summit, however, Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Shimano) decided to anticipate the favourites by launching an attack on the false flat.

 

Valverde makes his attack

As Gorka Izagirre and Herrada kept the pace high for Movistar, they swallowed up the Dutchman on the descent before BMC moved to the front with Philippe Gilbert and Tejay van Garderen. The former rode on the front for a little while before again giving way to Izagirre.

 

From the bottom of the final climb, Sutherland took a huge turn for Tinkoff-Saxo and when the Australian had swung off, it was Benat Intxausti who prepared Valverde's attack. The Movistar leader attacked very early on the climb, with only Contador being able to stay on his wheel.

 

A strong chase group

Kwiatkowski tried to follow them but quickly realized that it was mission impossible and so fell back to a group with Cadel Evans (BMC), Mikel Nieve (Sky), Tejay van Garderen (BMC), Damiano Cunego (Lampre-Merid), Yury Trofimov (Katusha), Roman Kreuziger (Tinkoff-Saxo), and Jean-Christophe Peraud (Ag2r). The peloton had now exploded to pieces and riders were spread all over the road.

 

Valverde just kept riding hard on the front but got an unpleasant surprise with a few hundred metres to the top when Contador launched his attack. The Movistar leader didn't even try to respond and at the top he had lost 15 seconds.

 

The chase group was more than 30 seconds behind and had dropped both Kreuziger and van Garderen. As the descent was a non-technical affair, the gaps remained almost constant all the way to the line, with Contador taking a beautiful solo win. Valverde crossed the line in second while Kwiatkowski made a great sprint to put in two seconds to his companions as he finished 3rd on the stage.