British champion finishes with the favourites on the Vuelta’s first mountain stage
After a disastrous team time trial on stage one of the Vuelta a España, Bradley Wiggins (Team Sky) ride himself back into contention at the finish of stage four on the top of Sierra Nevada. The British champion put teammate Chris Froome to work on the front of the ever-shrinking peloton in the final kilometres, in pursuit of breakaway riders Daniel Moreno (Katusha) and Chris Anker Sørensen (Saxo Bank-SunGard).
The two breakaway riders managed to stay away to contest the stage victory, with Moreno coming out on top, but the two Sky riders crossed the line in the group eleven seconds back.
"It was another good team performance today and Chris Froome rode his heart out for me again at the end there,” said the British champion after the stage. "He's looking really good at the moment and things are going well again. I was pretty happy with how I coped with the heat and am pleased to have finished where I did.”
Froome and Wiggins are now both 1’31” behind race leader Sylvain Chavanel (Quick Step), in twentieth and twenty-first positions respectively. They are still behind most of the riders that fared better in the team time trial, but there are a great many kilometres and mountains to go before the race reaches Madrid on September 11th.
"Obviously, it's still early doors in terms of the race though and we're just going to continue to take things day by day," Wiggins concluded.
Steven de Jongh, Wiggins sports director was pleased with the way the race had gone, and by the way that both British riders coped with the high temperatures of southern Spain.
"It went very well today and I’m really happy,” he said. “Brad and Chris were both to the fore again and the whole team were very active all day to combat the heat, fetching bottles and fuelling up. The temperature went up from 28 degrees to between 35 and 36 this afternoon so that’s a real challenge for everyone.
"It’s going to be an interesting day tomorrow,” he added. “It’s pretty tough and it will be hot again.”
Stage five starts close to today’s finish at Sierra Nevada and follows a saw-tooth profile to an uphill finish at Valdepeñas de Jaén. De Jongh expects a similar result to stage four as the race’s early visit to the mountains takes its toll on the peloton.
"We’ve got a late climb which comes just 8km from the finish and then there’s a real ramp right up to the line,” he explained, “so there are going to be splits once more."