2024 Volta a Catalunya Stage 2 Live Coverage
Welcome to our live coverage of Stage 2 of the 2024 Volta a Catalunya! Our live profile and commentary are below, followed by a preview of the technical aspects of the route.
Course Preview
As early as the 2nd stage the Volta a Catalunya transports the riders into the high mountains. It's the first of three high altitude finishes during one week of racing. The finish in the Vallter ski resort appears after a 11 kilometres climb with an average gradient of 7.6%, while the route totals 186.5 kilometres.
Mataró is the starting venue in Catalunya for the eighth time in the last decade. In fact, last year the race from Mataró also went to Vallter 2000. It came down to a three-up sprint with Giulio Ciccone besting Primoz Roglic and Remco Evenepoel.
Ciccone succeeded Adam Yates, who won the preceding two stages in Vallter 2000. Three years ago with a solo, and in 2019 he outsprinted his fellow-attackers Egan Bernal, Dan Martin, Nairo Quintana and Miguel Ángel López.
Vallter is a ski station at 2,150 metres above sea level in the Pyrenees, close to the French border. But since the road stops there it’s not possible to cross into the neighbouring country. The ascent is 11 kilometres long and averages 7.6%, but one could also argue that the climb begins in Camprodon and adds up to 22.5 kilometres with an average gradient of 5.5%.
The route is virtually a carbon copy of last year’s Mataró-Vallter stage. The riders race on predominantly flat roads to the the Coll de Coubet, which is a 10 kilometres climb at 5.4% with its summit 45 kilometres before the finish. The downhill is only 5 kilometres long and then the riders enter a false flat that rolls on for tens of kilometres to Camprodon and, eventually, the base of the finish climb.
The first three riders on the line gain time bonuses of 10, 6 and 4 seconds, while the intermediate sprints come with 3, 2 and 1 seconds.
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