Italy's Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas-Doimo) sits second overall at the Vuelta a España stage race in Spain with half the race remaining. Nibali, though, wanted better than sixth on yesterday's finish to Andorra behind Spaniard Igor Antón
"Maybe I suffered because it was the only climb of the day," Nibali told Italian newspaper La Gazzetta dello Sport, "and it is much harder to manage like that."
Nibali and race leader Joaquím Rodríguez (Katusha) followed a strong attack by Ezequiel Mosquera (Xacobeo-Galicia) with 4.5 kilometres remaining of the final 10-kilometre climb in the Principality of Andorra. Rodríguez cracked and fell back to eventually lose his race lead. Nibali held on for another 400 metres, but then cracked too.
The Vuelta a España is Mosquera's only chance to shine all year. The 35-year-old Spaniard gambled and nearly won. Nibali, however, is 10 years younger and needed to sense Mosquera made a risky, kamikaze attack. He needed to pace himself as Igor Antón did. Antón recovered and not only took the stage win, but the race leader's red jersey.
"Mosquera went very strongly and I made a mistake to follow him," Nibali added. "Then I had to let up and go at my own pace. I tried to keep up, but was just going stronger."
Nibali finished 23 seconds back in sixth place – behind Antón, Mosquera, Xavier Tondo, Marzio Bruseghin and Rigoberto Uran – but jumped ahead of Rodríguez to second overall in the classification.
In May, Nibali helped Italian team-mate Ivan Basso win the Italian three-week race, the Giro d'Italia. Here in Spain, he could use a super domestique like Basso or Sylvester Szmyd. Roman Kreuziger may recover some of his power and fulfil that roll in the coming mountain stages. The next mountain stage is Saturday to Peña Cabarga.
In Italy, Nibali also held the leader's pink jersey for three days and won the mountain stage to Asolo. His achievements and work for Basso signaled him as Italy's rising stage race star. He can take pride in the fact that in Spain he has already distanced himself from two-time Vuelta winner Denis Menchov, 2008 Tour de France winner Carlos Sastre and Fränk Schleck.