Vuelta a Espana Final Review - Contador wins overall, Degenkolb wins final stage

Today's Stage: The final sprint in Madrid. Nothing other than a stage win and the Green and Combined Jerseys on the line.

Who won today's stage? It was a sprint. John Degenkolb (Argos-Shimano) hadn't won one of those in awhile, but he took today's easily over Elia Viviani (Liquigas-Cannondale). The win was Degenkolb's fifth stage win of the race, easily confirming himself as the best sprinter in this weakened field of sprinters (most stayed away because of the mountainous nature of this Vuelta course that gave them few stages to target.

Final GC: No changes today, as expected in the final General Classification. Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff) finished with the main group to confirm his overall victory followed by Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) and Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha). Here is the final top 10:

1 Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff)

2 Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) +1'16”

3 Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) +1'37”

4 Chris Froome (Team Sky) +10'16”

5 Daniel Moreno (Katusha) +11'29”

6 Robert Gesink (Rabobank) +12'23”

7 Andrew Talansky (Garmin-Sharp) +13'28”

8 Laurens Ten Dam (Rabobank) +13'41”

9 Igor Anton (Euskatel) +14'01”

10 Benat Intxausti (Movistar) +16'13”

What matters in the other competitions?

Green Jersey (Points) – Valverde took sixth on the stage in the sprint while Rodriguez finished outside of the points. This allowed Valverde to overtake Rodriguez and steal the jersey on the final day (the second year in a row this has happened as Bauke Mollema overtook Rodriguez to win the jersey in Madrid last year). Here is the final top 5:

Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) 199

Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) 193

Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff) 161

John Degenkolb (Argos-Shimano) 149

Daniele Bennati (RSNT) 107

Polka Dot Jersey (King of the Mountains, it's blue in Spain, not red) – Simon Clarke (Orica-GreenEdge) sealed this jersey early on the Bola del Mundo stage. His work done, he sat up and slowed home after that and today with the Mountains jersey and a stage win in his pocket. Here is the final top 3:

Simon Clarke (Orica-GreenEdge) 63

David de la Fuente (Caja Rural) 40

Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) 36

White Jersey (Allround, instead of young rider, calculated by adding the rankings in GC, Points and KoM, lowest score wins) – Rodriguez had led this jersey for so long that it may have seemed impossible to catch him, but Valverde did, forging a tie and winning on the tiebreaker of higher in GC Classification. Here is the top 3:

Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) 8

Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) 8

Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff) 10

Team Classification (top 3 times by team on each stage) – No changes here, Movistar wins easily. Here are the top 3:

Movistar

Euskaltel +9'40”

AG2R La Mondiale +20'19”

Biggest surprise of the race: Alejandro Valverde's performance. Valverde, racing this season coming off a doping suspension was not thought to be a contender here. Heck, he wasn't even his own team leader (that was defending champion Juan Jose Cobo, more on him in a moment). Also, Valverde had struggled through the Tour de France taking one stage where he had to empty the energy tank entirely and likely still would have been caught if not of Team Sky team orders. Given that form and situation, seeing Valverde emerge as Movistar's contender was a big surprise.

Biggest disappointment: Speaking of Mr. Cobo. He was awful. From day one. In the Team Time Trial he lost contact with his team and lost five seconds. Then he was dropped by the leaders on the first mountain stage (good for Movistar staying with Valverde and Intxausti who were obviously in better form). By the end of the race, Cobo had sunk to 67^th place, over 2 hours behind Contador. Just awful, but given his season, this result isn't that bad. If anything, it calls into question the result last year as Cobo had a sudden one year spike ending in a Grand Tour victory while riding for one of the most notorious team managers in the world. With that team gone and Cobo away from him, he was back to domestique level and didn't even reach that in this race.

What's next for the peloton? Some are racing right now at the Tour of Britain while others are in Canada for the second of the World Tour races there (Michael Albasini of Orica-GreenEdge won the first). After those, everyone will converge at the World Champioship's, starting with the new Team Time Trial next Sunday.

Vuelta Stage 16 - Rodriguez extends his lead further

Today's Stage: Circle of Death – Part 3. By far the hardest stage of these three days in the mountains and quite possibly the 'Queen Stage' (that would be hardest stage) of the race (Stage 20 up the Bola del Mundo is also under consideration for 'Queen Stage')

Who won today's stage? Dario Cataldo (OPQS) and Thomas De Gendt (Vacansoleil) battled together for the stage win as the only breakaway survivors. Cataldo was able to drop De Gendt on Cuitu Negru and then survive one of the slowest stage finishes ever. Both Cataldo and De Gendt nearly fell off their bikes in exhaustion just at the sight of the finish line and the final three km took them over 15 minutes to complete.

What matters in the GC race? Overall leader Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) took the sprint for third over Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff), taking the time bonues and extending his lead again, now up to 28 seconds. Just behind them was Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) who confirmed his podium place in part because Chris Froome (Team Sky) finally exploded, losing over two minutes to the leaders.

What matters in the other competitions?

Green Jersey (Points) – More points for Rodriguez. His lead is now 52 over 4^th place John Degenkolb (Argos-Shimano), the main contender considering the other two in between are Valverde and Contador. Rodriguez can seal the jersey with a win on Wednesday or a win atop the Bola del Mundo on Saturday. Even without those, Degenkolb likely needs to win all three remaining possible sprint stages on Thursday, Friday and Sunday to take the jersey. Looks unlikely.

Polka Dot Jersey (King of the Mountains, it's blue in Spain, not red) – Simon Clarke (Orica-GreenEdge) is now holding on for dear life as the GC men continue to take points on all the uphill and summit finishes. In addition, stage runner De Gendt has appeared in 3^rd place and De Gendt has been very strong in week three of the last two Grand Tours he has entered. I suspect he will be in the breakaway looking for the King of the Mountains win on the Bola del Mundo stage with its three category one climbs before the final run up the huge climb at the end.

White Jersey (Allround, instead of young rider, calculated by adding the rankings in GC, Points and KoM, lowest score wins) – Same as it ever was. Even Froome cracking today changed nothing. Rodriguez still leads (as expected). Valverde is second and Contador is third. Froome is fourth but falling further behind every day as he is in the GC battle.

Team Classification (top 3 times by team on each stage) – Movistar has really extended this out the last couple of days. With three riders in the top 11 on the stage, they are now over 12 minutes ahead of second place Katusha.

Biggest surprise: Froome exploded as bad as he did. We have seen the signs that this was coming, but it looked like Froome was doing a good job of limiting his losses to a few seconds. Today, that was just not the case. As soon as the leaders went, Froome was with the second tier GC group and was beaten by many of them including Gesink, Ten Dam, Anton and Talansky.

Biggest disappointment: With the exception of Movistar domestique Nairo Quintana, nobody has stayed with the leader the last three days. Just once in this race, I would like to see the likes of Gesink and Talansky attacking with the leaders. Of course that would means risking positions if the attack failed so those riders are content to grind away.

Other items of note: Another two men dropped out of the race today. Pablo Lechuga (Andalucia) and Cameron Meyer (Orica-GreenEdge) were the two and there are now 17 men out of the race. As a whole, this has been a low-attrition race. The eventual toll of the stage 6 crash in the Tour de France alone was 12, when including those involved who dropped out on later stages.

What is coming tomorrow? Rest day tomorrow and then a long but not very steep ascent up a category 2 climb to finish.

Tomorrow's Prediction: Breakaway. Someone from both Caja Rural and Andalucia will be in it along with those in the mid-teens region on GC looking to sneak away and move into the top 10.

Vuelta a Espana Stage 4 Review - New leader... Again

Today's Stage: Remember yesterday with the early mountaintop finish that would never be seem in the Tour de France. Repeat. Different climb, another mountaintop finish.

Who won today's stage? Simon Clarke (Orica-GreenEdge) beat Tony Martin (OPQS) in a two-up sprint at the top of the mountain after they were the only two survivors from the breakaway that went away early in the stage.

What matters in the GC race? There were crosswinds. Crosswinds cause problems. Crosswinds cause lots of problems when a team attacks on the front. This happened before the final climb and it caught race leader Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) in a crash when riders were trying to move to the front. Then, in a matter of breaking one of cyclings unwritten rules (sit up and wait for the race leader when he crashes), everyone drilled it on the front of the peloton (more on this later). The peloton collapsed into many different groups and Valverde and his group got left behind, never making it back to the lead group. With this, Movistar sent Benat Intxausti back to help Valverde allowing Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) to assume the race lead. Chris Froome (Team Sky) is one second behind and Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank) is five seconds behind.

What matters in the other competitions?

Green Jersey (Points) – The three stage winners have the most points, but today's stage winner Simon Clarke has the jersey as he picked up points at one of the intermediate sprints today. He has 27 and stage winners Alejandro Valverde and John Degenkolb (Argos-Shimano) have 25.

Polka Dot Jersey (King of the Mountains, it's blue in Spain, not red) – As a mountaintop stage winner that was in the breakaway, Clarke also holds this jersey over yesterday's top breakaway attacker, Pim Ligthart (Vacansoleil).

White Jersey (Allround, instead of young rider, calculated by adding the rankings in GC, Points and KoM, lowest score wins) – This category usually ends up going to a GC man with a finishing kick and it already looks that way this year. Joaquin Rodriguez leads followed by Valverde, Chris Froome and Alberto Contador.

Team Classification (top 3 times by team on each stage) – Rabobank leads this competition. That is no surprise as they were highly ranked in the Team Time Trial and have three riders in the top ten overall (Robert Gesink, Bauke Mollema and Laurens Ten Dam).Behind them is Team Sky who have three riders within a minute of the overall lead (Chris Froome, Rigoberto Uran and Sergio Henao).

Biggest surprise: Movistar sent Intxausti back to help Valverde. When they did so, it was obvious Valverde wasn't making it back to the lead group. Given that, Intxausti should have stayed with the lead group in an attempt to retain the leader's red jersey.

Biggest disappointment: Wither Igor Anton (Esukatel). Anton just hasn't been the same rider since blowing up the day after his stage win in the 2011 Giro d'Italia. At that point he had crashed out with the lead in the 2010 Vuelta and won a stage and looked set for the podium in the Giro. After that, he never really fired except for the Basque stage last year. This year, he basically did nothing all season while targeting the Vuelta. And then he cracked today on the climb. Just not good.

Other items of note: About that unwritten rule that was broken: Today was payback. All season long, Movistar has attacked at the time of others misfortune. While others have often sat up when the race leaders crashed, the chance to pay Movistar back for a season of unpopular riding was irresistible and Valverde paid for it by giving up his leader's jersey... At the USA Pro Cycling Challenge, Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Sharp) turned himself inside out to get over the climb and then blew everyone away in the final sprint. Today that race finishes at Crested Butte where Levi Leipheimer (OPQS) won last year to take the race lead and set himself up for his GC victory.

What is coming tomorrow? Sprint stage. The most obvious one of the whole race outside of the final stage in Madrid. It is a circuit race with seven 21km circuits around Logroño.

Tomorrow's Prediction: John Degenkolb (Argos-Shimano), Elia Viviani (Liquigas-Cannondale), Ben Swift (Orica-GreenEdge)