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Vuelta 2018 Stage 6:Huércal Overa – San Javier 155.7km

The Vuelta rolls on to Thursday's stage -

Vuelta 2018 Stage 6:Huércal Overa – San Javier (Mar Menor) 155.7km Start 13.58 CET (as it's only 155 km tune in early!)

With stage 6 the Vuelta a España will be leaving Andalusia for a short while. The leg starts in Huércal-Overa and then travels north to San Javier for a flat finish near the famous Mar Menor salty lagoon in Murcia. The route amounts to 155.7 kilometres.

Stage 6 is a likely sprint stage. Which doesn’t mean the route is entirely flat. En route the riders are to crest the Alto de Garrobillo and the Alto Cuesta de Cedacero, both 3rd category ascents.

The Garrobillo – 3.8 kilometres at 5.8 % with the last 2.8 kilometres at 7.9% – is crested with 98.4 kilometres remaining, while the Vuelta travels over the Cuesta de Cedacero some 50 kilometres before the finish. This climb is slightly longer than the previous one, it counts 5.2 kilometres and the average slope is 5.2%.

The 6th stage runs mostly along the coast. Shortly after the flag has been dropped the course heads to the Mediterranean Sea and the riders move through Aguilas, Mazarròn and port city Cartagena to Europe’s largest salt water lagoon, Mar Menor. The last 15 kilometres of the route are entirely flat, so that’s plenty of time for the sprint teams to organize their troops.

stage-6-profile.jpg


Tricky last left hander after the flamme rouge
stage-6-finish.jpg


Map of the stage shows that it's along the coast so any onshore/offshore winds could cause havoc -

stage-6-route.jpg


(Edit -added start time)
 
Ah another Vuelta "flat" sprint stage.

search said:
[quote="<span class="skimlinks-unlinked">Valv.Piti</span>":1t3wded6]So the Vuelta actually has 4 stages in a row without an uphill finish? I cant believe this. I want a murito and it better be +11% in average.

well, strictly speaking, #7 and #8 are both uphill finishes ;)[/quote]

Yeah, technically those two are uphill finishes, but we end up with in those uphill finishes who knows and definitely not 11% average.
 
Apr 8, 2018
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The only thing that could open this stage up is Quick Step being forced to do all the work themselves and burning out their sprinter train
 
Well this changes everything!
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/bouhanni-and-vuelta-race-leader-molard-both-handed-time-penalties/
Molard was handed a 20-second time penalty in the general classification – a normal punishment for the offence – for having taken a feed from his team car inside the permitted distance to the finish of stage 5 in Roquetas de Mar on Wednesday, which cuts his overall lead to second-placed Kwiatkowski from the original gap of 1:01 to just 41 seconds.
 
Very weird break

With just 2 Cat 3's what is Mate doing? It's a long stage with headwind and no chance of a stage win.
Little Richie, I don't know, testing his legs.

Can anybody help me out and explain.