With yesterday’s win in the mountains, Team Katusha’s Joaquim Rodriguez got a renewed taste for victory, deciding to make it two-for-two with a second climbing stage win in the Basque Tour on Thursday. Coming around the final corner with only 100 meters to go, Rodriguez put himself at the front of the group to sprint across the finish line and claim back-to-back wins, earning his second win of the season and 17th team win.

Team Katusha has earned 10 wins in the last 13 days, marking the most successful run of victories in the history of the team.

“Finally I did it. I knew I had to go fast in the last two corners. I had to make up something after Valverde beat me in 2012 here after a photo finish. I didn't dare to lift my hands too early. Arrate is a classic finish and it is an honor to win here. It was a hard day again. The break had many minutes for most of the day. Movistar and Sky took the race in hand and the speeds were so fast. We were comfortable with Zakarin in the break, but the crash of Vicioso changed our team tactics a bit. I had to change bikes and then come back so that cost me some energy, but fortunately the last climb suited me very well,” Joaquin Rodriguez said.

“When Henao went, I thought Quintana would go too, but he didn’t. Then I spoke with Simon and told him I needed his help. Good positioning was more important than speed at that moment. Tomorrow also suits me very well. We cross the Aia pass three times. I like this stage the most of all of them. If I can recover from these past two days, we’ll see how I can do for the GC."

Following Joaquim Rodriguez to the finish line for second and third places were Bauke Mollema (Trek Factory Racing) and Simon Yates of Orica-GreenEdge. The winning time was 4:05.10. There was no change on the general classification with Sergio Henao (Sky) still in the lead, with Rodriguez and Nairo Quintana (Movistar) in second and third places, all on the same time.  Team Katusha’s Ilnur Zakarin and Simon Špilak are sixth and 10th on GC, both at ten seconds behind the leaders, making three Team Katusha riders in the top 10.  

“The plan today was on the last climb try to help Joaquim for the final. We knew he had a good chance. We put Zakarin into play and then used Simon to work with Joaquim. When Movistar attacked, Zakarin did a very good job following the moves and in one moment he was alone in the front. Then at the top when the group caught back on, we had three riders in the front to take control.  It was a very good stage for us. It was so fast right from the beginning. Unfortunately we had the crash from Vicioso,” said team sports director José Azevedo, referring to a race-ending crash from Angel Vicioso that broke his left collarbone and will require surgery on Friday.

Ilnur Zakarin, third place on the opening sprint stage, played a big part in today’s action. With the field climbing the steepest section of the Arrate, Zakarin shot up the left-hand side of the road and quickly opened a gap. As Zakarin worked alone on the approach to the summit, yellow jersey Sergio Henao came across to him with Zakarin quick to jump on the wheel and sit there. By 1,8 km to go, the group behind, led by Špilak, reached the duo and the quick plunge to the finish line followed with Rodriguez in the right place at the right time to earn the victory.

Stage 4 featured 7 categorized climbs on course. The 162,2 km stage began in Zumarraga and ended on the Arrate in front of a massive crowd of Basque fans. An initial breakaway of four gave way to two as the stage wore on, with the last effort neutralized on the base of the 7 km long Arrate climb.

It’s another high finish for Friday’s stage 5 although the last climb is not as big as today’s final pitch.  The 156 km stage begins in Eibar and ends in Aia after crossing 7-rated climbs. It will be the last opportunity for the GC contenders to shape the overall classification before Saturday’s time trial.