Imanol Erviti (Caisse d’Epargne) won the tenth stage of the Vuelta a España between Tarragona and Villanova i la Geltrú after escaping from the day’s main breakaway group. Romain Zingle (Cofidis) led home the remains of the group, ahead of Greg Van Avermaet (OmegaPharma-Lotto) at the end of the hilly 175.7km stage.
Officially classified as a flat stage, the route nevertheless took in a number of unclassified climbs as it passed through the Catalan countryside; it also included the first category Alto del Rat Penat with just over 30km to go. Coming between the rest day and tomorrow’s big mountain stage to Andorra, the scene was perfectly set for a breakaway, but not before a local rider staked his claim to the red jersey.
“[Jose Vicente] Garcia Acosta, David Lopez, [Luis] Pasamontes and me always try to be in the breaks,” said Erviti after his victory. “David, with his win, on Sunday and me today had the luck to get a reward for the team.”
“It was a difficult descent,” he continued. “I noticed that the other riders were very careful. There were some doubts in the group and I decided to try it solo. I am a good rider in this kind of stages and got the best out of my skills.
“In the last Tour de France we were close to the victory,” he added, “now it seems that we have the necessary luck and we are getting the victories in a row”
As usual there were a great many escape attempts in the early kilometres, but with local rider Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) equal on time with race leader Igor Antón (Euskaltel-Euskadi) the Russian team kept everything under control until the race reached the first intermediate sprint of the day. In the town of Valls, after 41.2km, Rodriguez followed sprinters Mark Cavendish (HTC-Columbia) and Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Transitions) across the line to take the final point; more importantly though, the Catalan rider took 2 bonus seconds, giving him the virtual race lead over Antón.
Once the sprint was over the Katusha team, along with the rest of the peloton, relaxed and a group of 12 riders was allowed to escape.
The break was made up of: Erviti, Zingle and Van Avermaet, with Biel Kadri (AG2R-La Mondiale), Javier Moreno (Andalucia-Cajasur), Giampaolo Cheula (Footon-Servetto), Christophe Le Mevel (FDJ), Manuele Mori (Lampre-Farnese Vini), Mauro Finetto (Liquigas-Doimo), former race leader Philippe Gilbert (OmegaPharma-Lotto), Laurens Ten Dam (Rabobank) and Anders Lund (Saxo Bank).
Gilbert was the best-placed rider in the group, starting the day just 1’55” down on Antón and Rodriguez, and the Belgian took 6 seconds in the second intermediate sprint of the day. Purito had no intention of letting his newly acquired red jersey slip between his fingers and so his Katusha team worked hard to prevent the break’s advantage from getting too high; after 112km though, the gap had risen to 5’38” before the Russian team’s work began to reduce it once more.
As the break hit the lower slopes of the Rat Penat its lead had reduced to little more than 3 minutes, but Gilbert still held the virtual lead over Rodriguez.
Moreno and Le Mével led the group up the climb; either feeling the exertions of his first week in red, or knowing that the break was doomed with his presence, Gilbert sat up on the climb.
Over the top the gap was reduced to just 1’48”; Le Mével and Moreno’s efforts succeeded in dropping Cheula, Mori and Kadri. Mori managed to get together with stage 9 winner David Lopez (Caisse d’Epargne), Josep Jufre (Astana) and Carlos Barredo (Quick Step) who had attacked from the peloton, which by now was less than 50 riders strong.
On a small, unclassified climb with 20km to go Erviti attacked the rest of the group; he quickly pulled out a gap of 15 seconds, which steadily rose to 28 seconds by the 10km to go banner. With Gilbert now safely in the peloton the Katusha team switched off the chase; despite this the Lopez/Barredo group was still caught.
With 7km to go Moreno tried to bridge across to Erviti on his own, a sure sign that the chase was not going to work, but he was unable to get away from the others. With 2km to go Erviti’s lead was 40 seconds and only a disaster could prevent him from taking the second Vuelta stage of his career.
The Caisse d’Epargne rider crossed the line alone to take the Spanish team’s second successive stage victory. Zingle outsprited the chasing group home 37 seconds later ahead of Van Avermaet, with Dmitriy Fofonov (Astana) leading the peloton across the line 1’36” back.
Rodriguez’ 2 bonus seconds proved to be enough for the Catalan rider to take the leader’s red jersey from Basque Antón. For all Gilbert’s efforts in the breakaway the Belgian moves 4 seconds closer to the jersey he lost on Saturday, and moves up one place in the classification to 14th, ahead of Tom Danielson (Garmin-Transitions).
Result stage 10
1. Imanol Erviti (Spa) Caisse d’Epargne
2. Romain Zingle (Bel) Cofidis @ 37s
3. Greg Van Avermaet (Bel) OmegaPharma-Lotto
4. Mauro Finetto (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo
5. Javier Moreno (Spa) Andalucia-Cajasur
6. Anders Lund (Den) Team Saxo Bank
7. Christophe Le Mével (Fra) FDJ
8. Giampaolo Cheula (Ita) Footon-Servetto
9. Laurens Ten Dam (Ned) Rabobank @ 42s
10. Dmitriy Fofonov (Kaz) Team Astana @ 1’36”
Standings after stage 10
1. Joaquim Rodriguez (Spa) Team Katusha
2. Igor Antón (Spa) Euskaltel-Euskadi @ 2s
3. Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo @ 4s
4. Xavier Tondo (Spa) Cervélo TestTeam @ 44s
5. Jean-Christophe Péraud (Fra) OmegaPharma-Lotto @ 54s
6. Ruben Plaza (Spa) Caisse d’Epargne @ 1’17”
7. Ezequiel Mosquera (Spa) Xacobeo-Galicia @ 1’20”
8. Nicolas Roche (Irl) AG2R-La Mondiale @ 1’21”
9. Marzio Bruseghin (Ita) Caisse d’Epargne @ 1’24”
10. Peter Velits (Svk) HTC-Columbia @ 1’28”