IAM went into stage 3 of the Vuelta a Espana with the plan to ride for Vicente Reynes. However, the final climb was a bit too tough for the veteran Spaniard.

A day after having worked hard for Matteo Pelucchi to earn his strong 10th place, IAM Cycling threw their strength behind Vicente Reynes for the demanding finale which marked the third stage of the Vuelta.  Everything was going well until 300 meters from the line, which was situated at the top of a tough hill. 

Although well-launched by Aleksejs Saramotins, Reynes was forced to bow to the physical strength and freshness of riders like Michael Matthews (Orica GreenEDGE), who won ahead of Daniel Martin and Joaquim Rodriguez.  Matthews’ surge even earned him the leader’s red jersey off the back of Alejandro Valverde.     

Vicente Reynes, who came in 57th place 33 seconds back, acknowledged he lacked the punch he would have needed to challenge the best. 

“The stage was really hard without a meter of flat, then there were three demanding categorized climbs, not to mention the climbs that were not even listed.  Plus, we were fighting tough conditions with wind and heat.  We were well placed for the finale.  But as the favorites started to surge, I could not manage to take it to another level.  We will continue to try our luck tomorrow.”

For his part, Jonathan Fumeaux joined the day’s main break, but was tailed-off the back when they tackled the second of three climbs, and ended up finishing in 189th place, 16’35” back. 

“I decided that if possible I would go away with a break in order to accrue points for the mountains classification.  But I ended up in a group of top riders and in addition to that, I suffered greatly from the heat.  That meant that I wasn’t able to follow the pace up the second climb.  I had a pretty complicated end of the stage.”