Stage 18: Salamanca - Monastério de San Jerónimo de Yuste, 171km
GPM:
Puerto del Rabanillo (cat.2) 9,0km @ 5,0%
Alto de Barrado (cat.2) 5,0km @ 7,3%
Monastério de San Jerónimo de Yuste (cat.3) 1,8km @ 6,2%
Immediately following yesterday's sprint stage, there is zero transfer and the riders instead stay in Salamanca overnight before the 18th stage, which takes us from Castilla y León into Extremadura, the penultimate new Comunidad that the race visits; Murcía and La Rioja are the only ones on mainland Spain that the race doesn't visit, in fact. Extremadura is one of the less densely populated parts of the country, and as a result features comparatively rarely in the race routes, and frequently only in passing. The last stage finish in the region was a 2013 flat stage in Cáceres won by Michael Mørkov; before that it featured on the 2006 route (though a 2011 flat stage passed through the easternmost parts of the area) with two sprint stage finishes (won by Fran Ventoso and Erik Zabel) and the main body of a mountain stage which finished at La Covatilla in the Sierra de Béjar.
In fact, that has frequently been the lot of the mountains that Extremadura has to offer - serving as the warmup climbs for a finish in Castilla y León. Today, however, we are doing the reverse, starting on the high plateau in Salamanca, and descending through the popular ecotourism spot that is the Valle del Jerte, which forms the boundary between the Sierra de Béjar and the larger Sierra de Gredos, before undertaking some of the smaller climbs in the latter range. After the initial part of the stage is simply rolling as we head past towns like El Barco de Ávila, the riders descend through the summit of the Puerto de Tornavacas (which is absolutely not categorization-worthy from the north, since it basically forms the edge of the plateau with no real ascent, even compared to similarly-styled passes like Ventana south and Somiedo south), with spectacular views of the Valle del Jerte below.
The riders then descend from Tornavacas into the first intermediate sprint in the town of Jerte. The road is
fairly straightforward and the descent is far from the most technical, and is wide enough to prevent too much hassle for the péloton.
This stage is likely to be one for the break, as with the last few stages in the run for home to come, few riders are likely to make a bid for glory far from home on this stage. It is for this reason that I chose the run-in climbs that I did. A more conventional approach when finishing at Yuste as I am would be to go via the cat.1
Puerto del Piornal. However, from this side I am afraid that it would not produce much in the way of racing, being nearly 17km long but mostly a very consistent 5%; the max slope is only 8% and in order to finish with the final ramps in Yuste I would need to descend via Jaraíz de la Vera, meaning it would be no closer to the finish than Barrado is in the stage design. The choice of Barrado also means we get a double-stepped ascent which essentially consists of two cat.2 climbs (hence I have categorized them as such) - firstly the relatively narrow but gradient-wise unthreatening
Puerto del Rabanillo, and then the more dangerous Alto del Barrado, with a maximum gradient of 14% and a final kilometre at over 8%.
Cresting 23km from the line, if the breakaway does take this one, you can expect this to be where it starts to collapse upon itself as anybody with aspirations of the stage win but not willing to take their chances in a puncheur standoff will need to take flight. The
occasional steep ramps will serve as a platform for these attacks, with even the occasional stretch on the central section, which attaches the EX-313 in Barrado with the CC-139 from Piornal, on
hormigón, which will aid attackers of course.
The descent into Jaraíz de la Vera, famous for the
Lago de Jaraíz, is mostly fairly gradual and on widish roads, though there are a couple of technical tests. Jaraíz comes in the midst of downhill false flat and at just 8km from the line, hosting the intermediate sprint. There is then a brief repecho to climb out of the valley as the riders pass the Lago and head into Cuacos de Yuste, before turning left back towards the Puerto del Piornal to take on the final, 3rd category (if it weren't the finish it probably wouldn't be categorized) ascent to the Monastério de Yuste, a monastery in this otherwise quiet area of the Sistema Central with a chequered and interesting history which includes being immortalized by Giuseppe Verdi and restored by Francisco Franco.
As puncheur finishes go, it's not the most threatening; the last 800m average slightly under 5%, while the first kilometre has a max of only 9%. It's perhaps more aimed at the Gilberts of this world than our earlier puncheur finish at Valdepeñas de Jaén; it's more Cauberg than Mur de Huy. The likes of Michael Matthews, if he can get over the two earlier climbs, would also consider this a good day for him if the break is reeled in. The presence of a puncheur finish means that even though they may come to the finish several minutes after the leaders on the day, the heads of state will have to devote some energy to ensuring they don't lose any time here, but they'll want to be careful because the next two days are serious stuff.
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