2015 Vuelta a España Stage 11 Results & Recap
Stage 11 of the 2015 Vuelta a España is in the books. The final results and standings are below, followed by our recap of how the race unfolded.
Race Recap
Landa wins Andorra epic
Mikel Landa (Astana) secured the win on stage 11 of the Vuelta a Espana with memorable display in the mountains. The 25-year-old was part of the day’s early break and skipped away from his companions on the final climb of the 138km stage to hang on ahead of the fast finishing overall contenders.
Landa’s win painted only part of the picture for a dominant Astana team with Fabio Aru dropping all his rivals on the final ascent to finish second on the stage and take the leader’s jersey from Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin).
Chris Froome (Team Sky) who came into the stage with his overall ambitions reignited after a strong ride on stage 9 crashed early in today’s stage and was dropped several climbs from the finish. He came in over eight minutes down, losing any chance of winning the race overall.
Nairo Quintana and Alejandro Valverde both lost time to Aru, while Joaquim Rodriguez (Team Katusha) put in a dogged display to keep his overall ambitions alive.
Aru now leads Rodriguez by 27 seconds with Dumoulin a further three seconds back. Valverde is 6th at 1:52, while pre-race favourite Quintana is over three minutes in arrears.
The day had been billed as one of the most epic stages ever put together in a Grand Tour with six climbs and a summit finished packed into the 138km stage.
The action was fast and furious from the off, first with Froome’s crash and then with a significant break going clear. However the stage and the overall battle would come down to the final climb with Landa attacking the remnants of the break near the foot of the ascent.
Astana had already been leading the bunch over several of the previous climbs and although Movistar and Katusha briefly threatened the Khazak team’s dominance when Valverde and Rodriguez moved clear on a descent, when the race re-grouped Aru’s team reasserted their control with Luis Leon Sanchez and Dario Cataldo ever-present.
Aru launched his first attack inside the final 8km and brought Rodriguez and his teammate Daniel Moreno with him. Landa had a two minute advantage but Aru was in no mood to calculate – his eyes firmly focused on the red jersey. His second acceleration did in the Katusha pair, while Dumoulin’s strategy of setting a steady tempo paid dividends. While Quintana, Valverde and several others attempted to match Aru’s drive for home, the Dutch rider kept calm - a tactic Esteban Chaves later employed – to keep his top ten ambitions on track.
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