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Vuelta Asturias starts today, a shame it isn't televised as the route is pretty good and the field is at least halfway decent with Quintana, Latour, Zakarin and Tour of Turkey winner José Manuel Díaz.
First I clicked on the results and there was only Nairo, now after some time there's at least also Latour... I wonder whether the others haven't come in, yet.
Going to be OTL soon.Just really slow...
01 | Nairo Quintana | Arkéa-Samsic | 05:03:45 | 14 | |
02 | Antonio Pedrero | Movistar Team | + 26 | 5 | |
03 | Pierre Latour | Total Direct Energie | + 27 | 3 | |
04 | Gotzon Martin | Euskaltel-Euskadi | + 49 | | |
05 | Alejandro Osorio | Caja Rural-Seguros RGA | + 49 | | |
06 | Cristian Scaroni | Gazprom-RusVelo | + 49 | | |
07 | Roger Adriá | Kern Pharma | + 49 | | |
08 | Nelson Oliveira | Movistar Team | + 49 | | |
09 | Einer Rubio | Movistar Team | + 49 | | |
10 | Julen Amezqueta | Caja Rural-Seguros RGA | + 49 | | |
11 | Ilnur Zakarin | Gazprom-RusVelo | + 49 | | |
12 | Jose Hernandez | Team Medellin | + 49 | | |
13 | Victor De La Parte | Total Direct Energie | + 49 | | |
14 | Jhojan Garcia | Caja Rural-Seguros RGA | + 49 | | |
15 | Luis Angel Mate | Euskaltel-Euskadi | + 01:32 |
3 solo stage victories in a row for Nairo? The stage profiles certainly suggests so. Seeing how dominant he was in the first stage, even though it was probably the least suited to him of the three.Nairo wins the first stage. No competition for Nairo.
7 Nguyens in Top 10.We're on the home stretch in Vietnam, with the ceremonial traditional finish on April 30th ready in sight, when the penultimate stage from Đà Lạt to Bảo Lộc set off yesterday morning on a shortened (98km instead of the originally planned 110km) route. This meant there were a couple of climbs but it would be largely a downhill route, so a fast stage was expected, as well as it being the last chance to take any chance - no matter how remote - to challenge Loïc Désriac's GC lead. Javier Sardá had an exploratory attack over the summit of đèo Phú Hiệp and gained a few seconds, but with it being just a cat.4 climb and 48km from the finish, it was more a move about securing the polka dots than a realistic attempt to dethrone the Frenchman as BikeLife quickly set their troops to work and neutralised the Cantabrian. 620 Châu Thới-Vĩnh Long were the best placed team without a stage win, and they worked hard to rectify that, with first team leader Võ Thanh An attacking, and then when he was caught just after the last intermediate sprint (probably a misjudgement by DDT), they got a man into a counter attack move of four, then when that was neutralised, Nguyễn Minh Thiện setting off for home with 15km remaining. His move was initially greeted with little reaction, but when his lead topped out at 30 seconds a reaction was provoked. The largely downhill nature of the stage meant another express pace - over 47km/h - and the Vĩnh Long rider was aided in his quest to stay away by a disorganised chase behind, with lots of counterattacks, both from those trying to manoeuvre their position in the GC, Vinama riders trying to overcome the 36" they needed to win the Teams Classification, and stagehunters looking to escape if the pace was raised such to bring back Nguyễn Minh Thiện. Sadly for them, however, it wasn't; repeated changes of pace made it hard for the péloton to keep tempo, while, though he was fading, the lone fugitive was able to keep going at his own speed, and held on through the streets of Bảo Lộc by just the skin of his teeth, coming in 2 seconds ahead of the heavily reduced péloton, which was led home by Javier Sardá who took 6 seconds out of his deficit, but nothing like enough to make a difference overall.
This set up the final 163km run from Bảo Lộc into the race's home in Hồ Chí Minh City, to finish in front of the Independence Palace as per tradition. Last year they had the traditional finish, but they couldn't hold it on April 30th, a symbolic date to match that on which the North Vietnamese tanks arrived at the palace gates to end the Vietnam War and reunite the country. Unlike most races with traditional finishes, however, there is no circuit here like on the Champs Elysées, and in fact because of the ceremonial nature of the ride into town, it's actually usually settled by baroudeurs.
That was the case today as well, with the early descent down into the Mekong Delta and then consecutive attempts by Vinama and Lộc Trời to try to manoeuvre some GC action with a strong break driving the pace once more up above 45km/h, before the big sprinters contested the final intermediate sprint, even though Nguyễn Tấn Hoài had built up a virtually unassailable lead in the classification. After this, it was the turn of the non-GC teams to try to generate some action, and the ever-combative Quân Khu 7 team (they won the team combativity prize, which is a thing in Vietnam) sent Phạm Lê Xuân Lộc up the road, first as part of a group, and then with 50km remaining, solo. He was pulled back with 10km remaining, after which Vinama sent Trần Thanh Điền and Nguyễn Minh Việt to attack together - the latter being well placed on GC as well as BikeLife's Teams lead being tenuous meant that they worked hard to bring this move back. Then, with 1km remaining, stage 21's winner Nguyễn Minh Thiện attacked while the sprinters were hesitating over setting up their leadouts. It has taken the Vĩnh Long team 21 stages to get that winning feeling, but thanks to Nguyễn Minh Thiện they pick up consecutive stages to finish the race on a high note, as he stayed away just a few seconds ahead of the bunch, which was led in by a straggling counter-attack fronted by Nguyễn Hữu Thành of the Quân Doi team, taking the bonus seconds out of the mix and meaning the final GC would be unchanged.
Final GC
1 Loïc Désriac (BikeLife-Đồng Nai) 51'28'19,82
2 Javier Sardá Pérez (Vinama-TP Hồ Chí Minh) +51"
3 Nguyễn Hoàng Sàng (BikeLife-Đồng Nai) +1'43"
4 Phạm Quốc Cường (Domesco Đồng Tháp) +2'37"
5 Nguyễn Tuấn Vũ (Vinama-TP Hồ Chí Minh) +2'41"
6 Nguyễn Thắng (Vinama-TP Hồ Chí Minh) +2'58"
7 Nguyễn Hướng (BikeLife-Đồng Nai) +2'59"
8 Nguyễn Phạm Quốc Khang (BikeLife-Đồng Nai) +3'04"
9 Nguyễn Minh Việt (Vinama-TP Hồ Chí Minh) +3'16"
10 Nguyễn Tấn Hoài (Domesco Đồng Tháp) +3'24"
7 Nguyens in Top 10.
Considering how common the name is in Vietnam, it's actually quite impressive that they're over-represented in the top 10. Estimates are that approximately 40% of Vietnamese bear the name Nguyễn, but since 2 of the 3 non-Nguyễn riders in the top 10 are overseas riders, 87,5% of the Vietnamese in the top 10 of the HTV Cup do.7 Nguyens in Top 10.
Considering how common the name is in Vietnam, it's actually quite impressive that they're over-represented in the top 10. Estimates are that approximately 40% of Vietnamese bear the name Nguyễn, but since 2 of the 3 non-Nguyễn riders in the top 10 are overseas riders, 87,5% of the Vietnamese in the top 10 of the HTV Cup do.