A long flat 180 km and then a demanding 4 km climb to the summit arrival in Mirador de Lobeira. These were the characteristics of the 3rd stage of Vuelta a Espana.
The race gave Luca Dodi the chance to make a show himself off once again after the bad period he has been through the past months. In December he broke his leg and was forced to stop for 5 months, then he started again to pedal and he came back to race in Clasica San Sebastian.
Today, Dodi lived the feelings of pedaling for 140 km in the front of the race with 4 other attackers.
After the neutralization of the breakaway at 40 km to go, the best climbers fought on the final climb. Horner made the winning move at 1 km to go, reaching winning with 3 seconds down to 6 riders, among them was Michele Scarponi, who finished 7th.
With the victory on the stage, Horner is also the new leader of the general classification, while Ulissi is 21st 1'07 after Horner and Scarponi is 23rd 1'12" after.
With Luca Dodi in the breakaway, Scarponi and Ulissi could relax in the peloton and try to position themselves in a good spot before the climb. But Scarponi wasn’t able to compete for the victory.
"In the early part of the race there were no hills or climb, but it was difficult because of the wind that caused some problems in the bunch and some crashes,” Scarponi commented, “My team mate Dodi was great in joining the main breakaway, allowing Diego and me to be covered in the bunch. I was able to approach the final climb in the early positions, but I was not competitive for aiming to the victory. Anyway, my performance was very good and I appreciate the improving of my form".
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