Vuelta a Andalucia Ruta Ciclista Del Sol 2018 – Stage 2 [FULL STAGE]

February 15, 2018

Vuelta a Andalucia Ruta Ciclista Del Sol 2018 – Stage 2 – Otura – La Guardia de Jaén (Alto de Allanadas) : 140 km

The Vuelta a Andalucía (Tour of Andalusia) or Ruta del Sol (Route of the Sun) is a regional Spanish road bicycle race first held in 1925. Since 2005, it has been a 2.1 category race on the UCI Europe Tour. The nickname, Ruta del Sol, is in reference to the region’s popular tourist coastline the Costa del Sol.

Wout Poels served triple duty on the second day of the Ruta del Sol by claiming the stage victory, surging to the race lead and, in turn, deflecting some attention from embattled Team Sky leader Chris Froome.

Poels prevailed from a five-man elite leading group on the Alto de Allanadas, jumping away to take the stage over Luis Leon Sanchez (Astana) and Tim Wellens (Lotto Soudal). Froome came across in seventh place, 27 seconds back.

Froome took the final climb with restraint, bridging up to the main group of favourites but sitting back as Poels made his move. He came across in seventh place, 27 seconds behind his teammate and still very much in contention with a 14.2km individual time trial still ahead on the last stage.

With the victory, Poels leads the race by two seconds over Sanchez and Wellens, with Mikel Landa (Movistar) and Astana’s Jakob Fuglsang at four seconds.

How it unfolded

It was another beautiful day in the south of Spain, where the riders of the Ruta del Sol faced a short but testing 140km from Otura to Jaén. The climbers were given their first opportunity of the week to shine on the final ascent of the Alto de Allanadas.

With the first climb, the category 2 Alto de Puerto Lope, cresting just before the 40km mark, the mountain points would go first to the breakaway. Nine men escaped with the points in mind: Alvaro Cuadros (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), Przemyslaw Kasperkiewicz (Delko-Marseille Provence KTM), Alexis Gougeard (AG2R La Mondiale), Pascal Eenkhoorn (LottoNL-Jumbo), Diego Rubio (Burgos-BH), Aaron Verwilst (Sport Vlaanderen-Baloise), Sho Hatsuyama (Nippo-Vini Fantini), Jeroen Meijers (Roompot) and Enrique Sanz (Euskadi-Murias).

The group had a sizeable advantage on the first climb, where Cuadros led over the top, amassing some seven minutes on the peloton before Astana came to the fore to keep them in check.

Cuadros led again over the back-to-back climbs of the category 3 Alto del Castillo and Puerto de Locubín (cat. 2) as the peloton began to steadily chip away at the breakaway’s advantage, bringing it to four minutes inside 40km to go.

The breakaway’s chances were hampered when Cuadros and Kasperkiewicz suffered mechanical problems on the descent of the Valdepenas, and the breakaway disintegrated.

Gougeard, Eenkhoorn and Rubio persisted, holding a two minute lead on the Astana-led bunch as they traversed the plateau leading to the final climb.

The pressure from Astana soon spelled the end for overnight leader Thomas Boudat (Direct Energie), who was jettisoned with 9km remaining.

Eenkhoorn was the next rider to lose contact with the leading group, with the towering Rubio dwarfing the more compact Gougeard as they hit the lower slopes of the Allanadas.

Rubio laid down the power with 4.7km to go, riding Gougeard off his wheel on a particularly nasty pitch.
On the same stretch, just under a minute back, Movistar came to the fore to slash at the gap.

The punishing gradient with 3km to go burned up most of Rubio’s remaining matches, but he survived it with a 36″ lead.
Jakob Fuglsang (Astana) attacked, reeling in Gougeard and then bringing Rubio into view.

Landa sensed the opportunity, and before Fuglsang could mow down Rubio, the new Movistar recruit danced across to the Astana rider, joined by Tim Wellens (Lotto Soudal) and then Wout Poels (Team Sky).

Rubio continued to fight but was finally pounced upon with 1.8km to go by this elite group, not helped at all by a close brush with a race motorbike.

Luis Leon Sanchez (Astana), Marc Soler (Movistar) and Jelle Vanendert (Lotto Soudal) and later Froome were among a handful of riders who clawed their way across to the leaders. With 1.4km to go Wellens decided to make his move.

At the kilometre banner, Wellens got a short breather thanks to a short descent, but he still had another punishing pitch to survive.

Poels leapt out of the chasing group with 500m to go and reached Wellens, but a group was quickly on them.
Fuglsang made the bridge with Landa and Sanchez on his wheel. The Dane gave his last for his in-form Astana teammate, but it was not to be for the team after all their work.

Poels launched his sprint ahead of the final bend and left his companions in the dust, leaving Sanchez to take second over Wellens.

Results :
1 Wout Poels (Ned) Team Sky 3:38:04
2 Luis León Sanchez (Spa) Astana Pro Team 0:00:02
3 Tim Wellens (Bel) Lotto Soudal
4 Mikel Landa (Spa) Movistar Team 0:00:04
5 Jakob Fuglsang (Den) Astana Pro Team
6 Marc Soler (Spa) Movistar Team 0:00:17
7 Chris Froome (GBr) Team Sky 0:00:27
8 Mikel Bizkarra Etxegibel (Spa) Euskadi Basque Country-Murias 0:00:34
9 Amaro Antunes (Por) CCC Sprandi Polkowice 0:00:38
10 Jelle Vanendert (Bel) Lotto Soudal

General Classification after Stage 2 :
1 Wout Poels (Ned) Team Sky 8:59:43
2 Luis León Sanchez (Spa) Astana Pro Team 0:00:02
3 Tim Wellens (Bel) Lotto Soudal
4 Mikel Landa (Spa) Movistar Team 0:00:04
5 Jakob Fuglsang (Den) Astana Pro Team
6 Marc Soler (Spa) Movistar Team 0:00:17
7 Chris Froome (GBr) Team Sky 0:00:27
8 Mikel Bizkarra Etxegibel (Spa) Euskadi Basque Country-Murias 0:00:34
9 Amaro Antunes (Por) CCC Sprandi Polkowice 0:00:38
10 Jelle Vanendert (Bel) Lotto Soudal