Vuelta - Stage 7, Fri Aug 30, Almendralejo-Mairena de Aljafare, **Unmasked Spoilers**

dastardly00

Stage 7: Almendralejo - Mairena de Aljafare 205.9km

It's the flattest stage so far of the race, and with the mountains looming tomorrow, the sprinters will want to take the honours today. It's another technical finish, with lots of sharp corners and roundabouts for the riders to deal with. Because the best of the best sprinters (i.e. Cav, Greipel, Kittel) aren't taking part in the Vuelta, it's making the bunch sprints very exciting as any number of riders have the ability and speed to win a stage. The main favourites today are Matthews (Orica Green-Edge), Meersman (OPQS) and Farrar (Garmin). But Ramon Sinkeldam (Argos-Shimano), Max Richeze (Lampre), Michael Mørkøv (Saxo-Tinkoff), Leigh Howard (Orica Green-Edge), and Eddie Boasson-Hagan (Sky) all have a great chance too.
Or maybe Tony Martin might do some 'TT training' again today! :P Or perhaps Spartacus might try!





Final 5km:


Betting: M Matthews 3/1; G Meersman 6/1; T Farrar 6/1.

Here's a link to the Irish rider's diary thread.

Live TV coverage on Eurosport2 from 3pm.
Highlights on Eurosport2 at 8pm, and on ITV4 at 7pm.

Live text-ticker will be here.

manafana

bit like yesterday with uphill finish in final km which should kill the chances of farrar but help meersman

Reginald P. DuM

Disaster for Dan, hit the deck with 11km left, looked sore but on a new bike now with 2 team mates to drag him back. Peleton moving along tho won't be easy...

Glass Prison 1214

Has Dan finished yet?

retalivity

stybar, just about!

Reginald P. DuM

Glass Prison 1214 wrote: »

Has Dan finished yet?

Not that we have seen.. Showing replays so he might have rolled in, but def lost GC time..... Case of damage limitation..

Bukman13

Glass Prison 1214 wrote: »

Has Dan finished yet?

He changed bike so he won't come up on the results for a while. He was in the group with van Summeren, Barta and Clement. So my guess is about 1 min 30 seconds lost.

AnotherView

Any news on Dan...hope he is ok

Yesterday and today he was at the end of the peloton for last 30km
Looks like he never had designs on GC ...maybe it was being put there by Team

ChainWhip

AnotherView wrote: »

Any news on Dan...hope he is ok

Yesterday and today he was at the end of the peloton for last 30km
Looks like he never had designs on GC ...maybe it was being put there by Team

He mentioned in yesterday's Indo diary that his main focus was the Worlds, hence sitting at the back.

Lepidoptera

This is such exciting race - lots of exciting finishes.

I really hope Dan is ok though. It was terrible seeing him on the ground like that and then riding so hard with his teammates trying to catch up. It must be so tough after a fall like that - physically and mentally - but he was clearly riding hard to make up time and distance.

Darkglasses

I'm away all day today. Was the stage good? Anything unusual happen?

Reginald P. DuM

Darkglasses wrote: »

I'm away all day today. Was the stage good? Anything unusual happen?

I saw the last 50km DK, the last 5 would have done... But in a day where it was the flattest terrain bar the final stage the sprint teams just couldn't get their acts together, again.... A timely jump and some good work by Gilbert and Stybar saw them allowed free inside 10km, after the early break of 4 had been caught, but the peleton couldnt organise themselves to nail the duo. Stybar just pipped Gilbert by a tyre. So still no sprinting hierarchy. Ferrar puntcured at 12km, seconds later Dan went down at 11km, they were there too help each other back on but was too late, Dan ended up losing 1:33 or the like.. He's now in a local hospital, we await to see the latest.

AnotherView

Dan Martin kept in hospital over night ...damn

ednwireland

did a double take on this earlier this was part of the news report on the vuelta finish tonight (on six one)


ffs rte how about not putting pictures of the 2012 tour some other race instead of 2013 vuelta

Bugsy2000

Thats a clip from todays World Ports in Holland by the looks of it.

ednwireland

Bugsy2000 wrote: »

Thats a clip from todays World Ports in Holland by the looks of it.

still wrong !

themandan6611

dan tweeted, no broken bones :-)

AnotherView

https://twitter.com/AlexRazi/status/373565777401876480

dastardly00

AnotherView wrote: »

https://twitter.com/AlexRazi/status/373565777401876480

Feckin' hell