2019 Vuelta a España Stage 2 Results & Recap
Stage 2 of the 2019 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
Quintana wins stage 2
It only took two days at the Vuelta a Espana for the GC contenders to come out to play. Nairo Quintana (Movistar) launched a late attack with three km to go out of a select group to claim victory on stage 2 into the seaside resort town of Calpe.
Nicholas Roche (Team Sunweb) and Primoz Roglic (Jumbo Visma) led the charge to the finish to finish second and third. Roche’s performance put him into the red jersey by two seconds ahead of Quintana. Rigoberto Uran (EF Education First) is sitting in third, at a further six seconds.
Despite a stage that appeared that it would be a sprint finish on paper, a dangerous group of six riders broke off the front on the final climb with 20 kilometres to go. Roche went away with Mikel Nieve (Mitchelton Scott), hungry for a stage win. Quintana, Uran, Roglic, and Fabio Aru (UAE Team Emirates) latched on quickly.
Race leader Miguel Angel Lopez missed the move, isolated after his teammates were spent after earlier efforts, and was forced to chase. The Colombian didn’t have enough to hold the jersey and had to be content with 15th place, 37 seconds down. Overall, Lopez has dropped to fifth, 33 seconds down.
The peloton took off from Benidorm for a 199 kilometre hilly jaunt through southeastern Spain. It took a while for the breakaway to escape, but when it did, Sander Armée made sure to be the first to instigate. His Lotto Soudal team keen to commemorate the memory of their recently passed teammate, Bjorg Lambrecht. Jonathan Lastra (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) went along with Armee and, after a hard chase, Willie Smit (Katusha-Alpecin), and Angel Madrazo (Burgos-BH) caught on with 50 km left.
Astana took over control over the peloton and let the break have a maximum gap of seven minutes. Bora-Hansgrohe added a couple of their riders to the mix and that’s when the gap started to dissipate.
Around 40 kilometres to go and sensing the peloton was close, Armee launched a last-ditch attack, but it wasn’t to be as the peloton was determined to start the final climb all together and launch their GC favorites off the front. \n
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