It was Froome’s second stage win of the Vuelta, but the Tour de France champion accepts he still faces a tough ask to overhaul Quintana.
Advertisement
The triple Tour de France victor started the 37.5km stage seemingly out of the picture at 3min 37sec behind the race leader, Nairo Quintana, but he regained more than 2min to leave himself just 1min 21sec behind the Colombian.
Froome finished 1:23 behind Quintana, while Esteban Chaves moved past Contador into a third-place finish after making up time with a long-distance attack.
“It’s a nice result, but I would much rather try to gamble and get into the top 10. I left it all out on the road”, he said.
“There’s still one more really tough day of racing tomorrow”.
Moviestar’s Colombian rider Nairo Quintana continues to lead the overall standings, a full 3 minutes and 37 seconds ahead of Sky’s Chris Froome.
Saturday’s stage will be over 193.2km, starting from Benidorm to include mountain passes of Rates, Ebo, Tollos and Tudons before finishing on the special category climb of Alto de Aitana, with the processional finale set for Sunday into Madrid.
“He’s a great rider, and his team was at a very good level, and they always made trouble for me. We will see”, Froome said.
Out of the overall contenders, Froome is the best time trial cyclist. “My stats weren’t bad and the important thing is I continue to have strong legs to be able to defend the lead”. I lost a bit more time than I expected, because Froome was just flying.
Advertisement
After the first intermediate time check, located at 12.5 kilometres into the 37km course from Xabia to Calp, Froome posted the fastest time and clawed back 46 seconds on Quintana. The 104.8km flat stage takes the riders from Las Rozas on the outskirts of the Spanish capital into a series of laps around the city centre.
