Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Vuelta stage 4



















Igor Antón suffered a major blow to his Vuelta aspirations earlier today as he ceded vital time to his GC rivals on the first summit finish in the race. The stage to Sierra Nevada was touted as the first showdown between the main pretenders for the crown in what is a mountainous Vuelta edition. Antón was tipped by many as perhaps the number one favourite for the stage-win but failed spectacularly and ended up ceding 1:38 to winner Moreno and 1:27 to the big group of overall favourites. Antón seemed out of sorts early on and was visibly struggling and might in the end not be too downbeat about losing "only" 1:38. It might have been a lot more hadn't it been for Gorka Verdugo who shepherded his captain all the way to the line. But still, it's unquestionably a big, big blow to his chances of ending up on the podium, let alone winning the race. On what was a tremendously disappointing day for the team, Mikel Nieve saved some pride with a fabulous ride. The super-domestique comfortably finished among the favourites to take 13th place at the same time as Rodríguez, Menchov, Nibali, VDB, Scarponi, Wiggins and co. Elsewhere, Amets Txurruka showed improving form by finishing 55th at 3:10, Oroz was 69th at 7:22, while Martínez, Cazaux, Isasi and Azanza came home with a big group at 18:27. Stay tuned for reactions later this evening.

8 comments:

Nick said...

I have to imagine he has some sort of illness/virus. There's no way he loses 1 minute plus to the likes of guys like Talansky and Marzano (no disrespect) unless there is some underlying factor.

If there's any good news from this its that he is only 2 min. down to Nibali and he is still ahead of Menchov (who I consider his two main rivals). If his health/form/fitness improves in the coming days, I'm still confident in him. Plus we still have Nieve who is pulling out a great ride!

bike master said...

agreed. typical Euskatel "on again... off again" style of racing. plus, with Nieve's pleasant surprise on today's stage, i wouldn't give up all hope just yet. Igor will be back on, i predict.

now then, if we are going to talk about "spectacular fail", i would suggest that HTC has taken a solid lead in that competition today. fortunately for them, Wiggins is looking quite good at this point (in my opinion).

awesome racing!

arnout said...

I didn't wanna say it yesterday as it was unconfirmed but Taaramae mentioned Anton dropping in the last km of the small climb yesterday (stage 3) too. So I was kinda expecting it, though hoping for the better.

It's sad. When he is in good form he always meets lady unlucky (if she exists). I bet you he won't crash this Vuelta...

Magnus said...

He did? That's interesting and not good news at all. I thought he looked in decent shape in Burgos so this doesn't really make sense...

Nick said...

Yeah I saw the Taaramae comment yesterday, but was hoping Igor was doing his typical hiding at the back of the peloton.

His form in Burgos was good, but maybe the fact that the Vuelta is starting a week earlier is getting to him (especially if he trained identically to last year)? He was dominant in week 1&2 last year and a similar training program should elicit dominance in week 2&3 of this Vuelta hopefully.

Or if he bonked in royal fashion today, he did a great job in damage control, and has hopefully gotten his bad day out of the way.

azanca02 said...

Just remember. it is a long race. I think that he can still make the podium. Nieve should look good for a top ten as well.

racejunkie said...

Mikel is really a revelation this year. It will be exciting to watch him develop in the next year or two especially as his growing palmares gives him more freedom to ride for himself. But I still think Igor can come back--agreed with Nick he must be feeling quite off for this to happen.

Kristof said...

Very strange. Igor is a fantastic climber, in his best days maybe the best in the world and when he is good he is really good, last year in the vuelta and this year the first two weeks in the giro italia. But he's a bit like Mayo, sometimes he's just really bad, like the last week in the giro, tour de france 2007 and 2009 and also today. I hope he gets better in time!

 

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