British rider Bradley Wiggins starts today’s time trial precisely one minute behind Vuelta leader Bauke Mollema (Rabobank) and knows that he has a perfect opportunity to take over the race lead if he rides as well as he normally does against the clock.
His strong GC position is thanks to what was an unexpectedly strong showing on yesterday’s ninth stage of the Vuelta a España. The Sky Procycling leader and his team-mate Chris Froome creating serious havoc to the GC aspirations of several of the big Vuelta contenders with a strong ride to the summit of La Covatilla.
The duo drove the pace on the climb, riding strongly in the buffeting sidewinds, and put riders such as overall leader Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) into real difficulty. Wiggins finished four seconds behind a darting Dan Martin on the stage, with Froome one place further back.
He’s just started today’s time trial and is in an extremely determined mood. Yesterday’s performance will have given him further motivation, particularly as he showed what was arguably his best-ever climbing form.
“I wasn’t thinking of tomorrow’s time trial as I was doing kind of an uphill time trial,” he said after the stage. “There was no point thinking of the future if I wasn’t in contention today. I set a fast pace. La Covatilla is a proper climb, not like what we’ve had in the last couple of days. In a climb like that, everyone has a chance. It’s not for only one type of rider. It’s more like a Tour de France stage, something I haven’t had the chance to do this year.
“Once I saw people were in difficulties behind I went into time trial mode and tried to take as much time off them as possible. Tomorrow is where I am expecting to make most of my gains and everything I earned here was a bonus – it was a fantastic finish and it couldn’t have gone any better.”
Many of those ahead of Wiggins on the general classification are far weaker time trialists than he is. He’ll aim for the red jersey of race leader today and feel confident about his chances, but won’t be just content to scrape into the race lead. There’s no more time trials left after today’s effort and so this is a chance for him to build an important time buffer over the other riders in the race.
As Wiggins himself concedes, the climbs ahead may not suit him as well as yesterday’s ascent. He’s known as preferring power climbs rather than dauntingly-steep slopes, and there’s at least one which he admits worries him. “The Angliru will be a different climb,” he admitted, thinking ahead to stage 15.
However he has promised to ride as well as possible. “For sure, I’ve got the legs to do something good at the Vuelta. I’ll give 100% everyday until Madrid. I have a good chance to take the leader’s jersey and we’ll start from there.”