CCC Polish Team’s
Greg Van Avermaet has won the third stage of the 70th edition of the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana, or Tour of Valencia.
Stage three
was the longest stage of the race and over 193kms from Quart de Poblet to Chera.
A group of ten riders in Duval, Andemeskel, Van Hecke, Barthe, Barcelo,
Kilikov, Alarcon, Moreira, Lopez and Rubio, the KOM leader in the Eurosport jersey,
were able to break after earlier attempts failed and were 2.40 ahead after
23kms of racing.
That lead went out to seven minutes with Van Hecke beating Rubio over the
category three Sot de Chera climb and taking the sprint points at Requena ahead
of Barcelo.
Van Hecke, followed that up with a second place to Rubio on the Alto de
Requena category three climb.
After 100kms of racing the gap was down to 5.55 and 6.10 after 114kms.
Rubio added to his points tally when he was first over the category three
Mata Parda climb ahead of Van Hecke and Duval.
With 33kms, the gap to the ten out front was still at 3.37
Rubio punctured as the gap dropped to ninety seconds with Van Hecke first
over the penultimate climb and with ten kilometres to go, the break was caught.
A Euskadi Basque Country rider led before Ben Hermans of Israel Cycling
Academy taking over on the front with five kilometres to go.
The big names including Greg Van Avermaet and Alejandro Valverde came up as
did the race leader.
Jack Haig and state two winner Matteo Trentin led going into the final
kilometre.
Greg Van Avermaet went with about three hundred metres to go and had the strength
to take the win in 5.00.16 ahead of Matteo Trentin with Luis Leon Sanchez in
third.
Edvald
Boaason-Hagen retains the yellow jersey with Diego Rubio in the Eurosport KOM
jersey.
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