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There are virtues in cycling that transcend physical strength, resistance to lactic acid and exhaustion. A great runner is not such without intuition, without the smell necessary to know when to move and when not, which is the good cut and which one is destined to fail. Nairo Quintana belongs to that lineage of ready guys, also Primoz Roglic , but not Miguel Ángel López , which will be huge the day he knows how to read the races as he knows how to chew the mountain passes , but for now it is only remarkable. Insufficient, however, to keep the red jersey of La Vuelta for more than a day. [Narration] [General classification]

Now Nicolas Roche takes it, celebrating as much as Roglic, who regained Calpe's way all the time he lost the first day in the team time trial. But no one happier than Quintana, who throws kisses at the camera when he crosses the finish line first, poses with a smile between defiant and sly and then simulates with his arms a soft flutter, as if saying he can still fly, that keeps the feathers and the ram and that nothing or nobody fears in this Tour that closes an era.

And when he reaches the goal of Calpe, knowing victorious, with the saltpeter flooding everything, he realizes how strange everything has been for a guy like him, a Colombian from Boyacá, so close to heaven, winning on the shore of the Mediterranean, at sea level. "I think he had never won like this," Quintana thought out loud, that he did not win by strong, but also, but by clever.

Escabechina in Puig Llorença

The Movistar leader did not enter any pool because the stage was written with another script. Puig Llorença, 30 kilometers from the finish line, had to screen the heaviest sprinters, those who do not support a slope of more than 100 meters. But what happened was very different and those three kilometers at 9.5% on average became a scallop. Poel, Geoghegan Hart, Kruijswijk or Soler already know that they will not win this Tour.

It was Formolo and Latour , second-order candidates, who hardened the race at Puig Llorença. Seeing that the thing was getting hot, Valverde in person decided to give continuity to the rhythm, causing only a score of runners to reach the summit in the main group, already with the escape of the day ( Madrazo , Lastra , Armée and Smit ) neutralized.

It was, however, in the descent when the best cut was formed. It happened at the initiative of Roglic, who was not willing to miss the opportunity to recover the time lost in the Torrevieja chrono. Snow , Quintana, Aru , Roche and Urán left with López's passivity, who only tried to defend his red jersey when his teammate Ion Izagirre exhausted his energies.

Superman understood that he was late for the party, that all he could hope for was to limit losses and that his leadership was history. The race was ahead and the sprint was going to be decided. That was at least the theory. The reality was quite different. Quintana realized the doubts that invaded his five teammates and attacked three kilometers from the end, on flat ground. Roche and Uran tried to react, but they did it late. Quintana was only going to see him at the finish line, throwing kisses, fluttering, remembering that he is ready as hunger and that he comes to this Tour for all.

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