Rodriquez Wins Vuelta a España Stage 15

Last updated : 06 September 2015 By Covsupport News Service

Joaquim Rodriquez has won stage fifteen of the 70th Vuelta a España.

A 178.5km stage from Comillas to Sostres. Cabrales started with Blel Kadri (AG2R - La Mondiale), Maxime Monfort (Lotto Soudal), Jelle Vanendert (Lotto Soudal), Amael Moinard (BMC), Kristijan Durasek (Lampre - Merida), Natnael Berhane (MTN - Qhubeka) and Syvlain Chavanel (IAM Cycling on the attack and soon joined by Carlos Verona (Etixx-Quick Step), Tosh Van der Sande (Lotto-Soudal), Antoine Duchesne (Europcar) and Rodolfo Torres (Colombia) before Movistar brought them back after twenty six kilometres.

Blel Kadri (AG2R - La Mondiale), Ricardo Vilela (Caja Rural - Seguros RGA), Dominique Rollin (Cofidis), Brayan Ramirez (Colombia), Nikolas Maes (Etixx - Quick Step), Natnael Berhane (MTN - Qhubeka), Pierre Rolland (Europcar), Maarten Tjallingii (Lotto NL - Jumbo), Haimar Zubeldia (Trek Factory) formed the next break and were 2.27 ahead after 47kms.

Their lead went out to four minutes before they started on the  alto del Torno which was first taken by the Canadian Dominique Rollin with Pierre Rolland in second place.

Going into the final twenty kilometres and the gap was down to 2.22 and then with Movistar piling on the pressure, the gap came down down to 1.33.

Onto the final climb which had gradients of 13% with some very steep ramps in the final few kilometres.

The leaders were 1.05 ahead with just over ten kilometres to go as Ramierz of the Colombian team tried to escape the clutches of the peloton before Nairo Quintana and Luis Leon Sanchez of Astana put in an attack.

Up the front, Zubeldia went off on his own and was able to stay away until there was 1.7kms remaining.

Tinkoff Saxo were on the front and with just under a kilometre to go, Katusha's Joaquim Rodriquez went away with race leader Fabio Aru trying to follow.

However, Rodriquez was too strong and away he went to record a famous victory in 4:33:31 with Rafal Majka of Tinkoff-Saxo coming in second some twelve seconds down, followed by Daniel Moreno, Nairo Quintana, Fabio Aru, Mikel Landa, Esteban Chaves, Mikel Nieve, Alejandro Valverde and Domenico Pozzovivo of AG2R La Mondiale.

The win put Rodriquez only a second behind Fabio Aru in the general classification and Rodriquez told his team's press office: "This is incredible. What a hard climb but what a nice win too. The cheering fans helped me a lot as well as my teammates. This is a phenomenal Vuelta. The whole Vuelta we were looking for this stage win. Now we have it and we even play a role for the GC. For the moment the situation is perfect for me. I miss one second for the race lead but that is not so important. In the end the strongest rider will win the Vuelta. The good feelings that I have now are more important than that red leader’s jersey. Tomorrow we have again a hard stage with possibilities. I will try again but if it doesn’t work I will try another day. I don’t want to use a calculator to find out how much time I need to take before the time trial in Burgos. In the past I calculated too much and it ended badly. I just look ahead from day to day. We came to this race to arrive on the final podium. We are on our way. Tonight we will shortly celebrate and tomorrow we will suffer again. In this Tour of Spain there are still nice things to come. The race is not over yet. One second behind Aru but 1.23 and 1.24 ahead of Majka and Dumoulin. Especially Dumoulin can still be dangerous. He lost time today but rode very cleverly and he will be hard to beat in the time trial. We’ll see."