• Tour: All stages of the Tour of Spain 2019
  • Classification: This is the general of the Tour

16 years distance Envalira from Mas de la Costa, Alejandro Valverde's first victory in La Vuelta de la twelfc . The scenario changes, wrinkles change, but the essential remains unchanged. He wins because he finishes like no one when the road is steep, because in the final meters he lacks a rival. "It's a phenomenon, it has a great killer instinct , " said on September 14, 2003, his boss in the late Kelme, Vicente Belda , about the 23-year-old Valverde emerging and that phrase retains its validity intact now that exceeds 39.

Valverde wins almost by habit, but after each win there is immense and thorough work. On this Friday in Mas de la Costa, the entire Movistar went out of its way to provide the best possible scenario for the Bala to shine. His gregarious to harden the race and reduce the group before the short but very hard final ascent and Quintana to guide the climb and take you to the last meters in the company of Miguel Ángel López, again leader, and Primoz Roglic .

They are the fantastic four of this Tour , those who lead the general classification and the strongest have proven to be, all compressed in 27 seconds . It has not been necessary for the stage of Andorra to arrive this Sunday for this reality to be revealed. In the first kilometer of the four of which there is the ascent to Mas de la Costa, Valverde, Roglic, López and Quintana were already at the top of the race without more company than they did between them.

It was Quintana who guided those final 3.5 kilometers of climb , working with two objectives, the individual trying to detach from Roglic and López and the collective to protect Valverde. Seeing the first impossible, the Colombian struggled in the second. "I thank him. He has had two balls," praised the world champion , whom Quintana had recognized the day before as leader of Movistar after a conversation on the bus with Eusebio Unzué. "He told me that he wanted me to be the leader, but I told him not to disengage," Valverde said after his triumph over that pact.

The case is that the four arrived grouped at the final 150 meters, to the 'Valverde area', at the distance in which the Murcia is known unbeatable, at least against opponents such as those who accompanied him. In those criminal ramps, at times greater than 20% of unevenness, the world champion started the sprint . Quintana and López yielded immediately and left six seconds in goal. Roglic got hooked to his wheel, enough not to give up a single second, not enough to fight him the victory.

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  • Primoz Roglic
  • Alejandro Valverde
  • cycling
  • Back to Spain
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  • Nairo Quintana

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