CYCLING – AFTER much anticipation, this year’s edition of the Vuelta a Andalucia has been marred by disruption caused by protests along the route in Spain.
With the first two days cancelled, organisers had changed the remaining parcours in an attempt to negate the issues, but in the end they announced yesterday morning that they had been, “forced to suspend the Saturday and Sunday stages due to extra-sports events that are happening in Andalusia”.
That meant that the 70th edition of the Ruta del Sol was reduced to a 4.9km individual time trial yesterday, starting and finishing in the ancient city of Alcaudete. The profile was slightly uphill, and the weather pleasant enough at around 14ºC.
On paper, Damiano Caruso was Bahrain Victorious’ strongest rider against the clock, and he finished in 13th place, 27 seconds behind the day’s winner, Maxim Van Gills (PRT). Six positions higher was the team’s designated GC leader, Santiago Buitrago, but Bahrain’s top performing rider was another Italian, Antonio Tiberi. The 22-year-old ended the day in third, and looks in good form as he prepares for Tirreno-Adriatico which starts in just over a fortnight.
Sports director Gorazd Stangelj believes Tiberi can carry this result forward to his upcoming races: “This was a really good result for Antonio. Looking forward to Tirreno, there is a short flat opening Time Trial, so he should take some confidence after today. The same for Damiano too.”
Despite a good ITT for the team, Stangelj couldn’t hide his disappointment at how the week unfolded:
“We are all disappointed. We really thought we would bring back some good results from here so it’s very disappointing, what has happened. We invested a lot for this race with all the staff we brought, and many days of preparation. We didn’t have correct information early enough even to train well, but that’s understandable because the organisation was always hoping to move forward with the remaining stages. Unfortunately this didn’t happen.”
The team returns to racing at the UAE Tour which runs from Monday to February 25.