2014 Vuelta a España Stage 5: John Degenkolb repeats in Ronda, Matthews keeps red
German sprinter John Degenkolb (Giant-Shimano) won his second consecutive stage in Wednesday’s Vuelta stage into Ronda. Michael Matthews (Australia/Orica-GreenEdge) kept his red jersey for another day.
A 182-km route in broiling heat with a Cat. 3 climb near the end wasn’t going to tempt a large breakaway. In fact, only Tony Martin (Germany/Omega Pharma-QuickStep) and Dutchman Pim Ligthart (Lotto-Belisol) were interested.
A mechanical with 70-km remaining sent Martin back to the peloton. Chris Froome (Great Britain/Sky) surprised his rivals by spurting out from the bunch to take two bonus seconds at an intermediate sprint.
Alberto Contador’s Tinkoff-Saxo had another surprise to spring. At the 40-km-to-go mark, the yellow gang whipped up the pace on wide, unprotected roads in a crosswind. The effort split the peloton, putting Ryder Hesjedal and his Garmin-Sharp teammates in the second group on the road.
The majority of the field came together on the opening slopes of the Cat. 3. Near the climb’s peak, King of the Mountains jersey wearer Luis Bonet (Spain/Caja-Rural) went for the points, but found himself vexed by the efforts of MTN-Qhubeka’s Sergio Pardilla (Spain). Bonet faltered so his teammate Amets Txurruka (Spain) had to bag the points himself.
BMC looked to put Philippe Gilbert (Belgium) into a launch position. Where the road rose to the line, Gilbert grabbed the wheel of a Giant-Shimano man and swung around him, but the green-clad German emerged on the left, squeezing Nacer Bouhanni (France/FDJ) into the barriers and taking the glory. Degenkolb added to his points competition lead.
Though Hesjedal’s teammate Dan Martin (Ireland) finished with the other GC men, the Canadian suffered a bad day and is out of contention for the win.
Thursday is the 2014 Vuelta’s first mountains stage and finishes on a Cat. 1 summit finish – the 4.6 km La Zubia climb at 7.8% average.
2014 Vuelta a España Stage 5
1) John Degenkolb (Germany/Giant-Shimano) 4:04:21
2) Nacer Bouhanni (France/FDJ) s.t.
3) Moreno Hofland (The Netherlands/Belkin) s.t.
90) Ryder Hesjedal (Canada/Garmin-Sharp) +3:19
116) Guillaume Boivin (Canada/Cannondale) +11:27
2014 Vuelta a España GC
1) Michael Matthews (Australia/Orica-GreenEdge) 17:35:05
2) Nairo Quintana (Colombia/Movistar) +0:13
3) Alejandro Valverde (Spain/Movistar) +0:20
46) Ryder Hesjedal (Canada/Garmin-Sharp) +4:15
133) Guillaume Boivin (Canada/Cannondale) +29:11