Richard Carapaz made his way through the mixed zone in Santa Rosa de Viterbo wearing an unfamiliar blue jersey and clutching a stuffed tiger. The Tour Colombia doles out more prizes than most and the Ecuadorian had just been feted on the podium as El favorito de la afición – ‘the fans’ favourite’ – for his efforts on stage 2.
If there was a straw poll of the overall contenders at the finish, they might also have voted for the EF Education-EasyPost rider. They certainly had reason to be grateful for his intervention given that a break of dangermen, including eventual stage winner Harold Tejada (Astana-Qazaqstan), had entered the final 20km of Tuesday’s stage clutching a lead of more than two minutes over the peloton.
For much of the day, Nairo Quintana’s Movistar squad had performed the bulk of the pace-making in the bunch, as the only one of the favourites without representation out in front. EF Education-EasyPost’s leaders Carapaz, Rigoberto Urán and Esteban Chaves had teammate Andrea Piccolo in the move, while Egan Bernal had two companions from the Colombian national squad up the road.
As the kilometres ticked down, however, it became increasingly clear that Quintana’s squad alone would not suffice to keep the break under control. On the run-in to the late climb of the Alto Malterias, Carapaz moved to the front of the chasing peloton, and his efforts helped to reduce the break’s spiralling advantage.
The final ascent did the rest, as the men with designs on overall victory came to the fore. The group of favourites was pared down to 20 riders, and they slashed their deficit before the short drop towards the line, eventually coming home 23 seconds down on Tejada who outsprinted Piccolo to the win.
“We wanted Piccolo to get to the line and fight for the win, but we also didn’t want to give up too much time,” Carapaz explained after he descended from the podium. “In the end, it was part of the strategy of the team. We knew that Rigo and Chaves were in a good moment too, so we just wanted to cut the gap a bit to stay in contention for the general classification.
“We were happy with the situation for most of the day, because we had Piccolo out in front and that meant we could stay a bit more calm, but it was still important to maintain our options for the days ahead.”
Thanks to the stage winner’s time bonus, Tejada now has a buffer of 34 seconds over Carapaz, Urán, Quintana and Bernal, and the Astana-Qazaqstan rider was…
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