Colombia’s Nairo Quintana is poised to win the Vuelta a España after maintaining his advantage over Britain’s Chris Froome on the penultimate stage of the race, which was won by France’s Pierre Latour.
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Barring a final-day accident or incident Quintana will celebrate a second Grand Tour success, with a 104.8km route from Las Rozas to the capital to encounter before officially sealing a maiden Vuelta title on Sunday.
Froome had reduced the Movistar rider’s advantage to 1min and 21 seconds after a superb individual time trial yesterday, but only had today’s 193 kilometre mountain stage from Benidorm to Alto de Aitana to overhaul his rival, with only a sprint stage to come tomorrow.
Tour de France champion Froome had taken a huge chunk out of Quintana’s lead in Friday’s time trial and knew his last chance was to launch a devastating attack in the final climbs.
But Quintana kept Froome in check throughout Saturday’s ride, responding to his repeated attacks on the final 21-kilometer (13-mile) climb before passing him just before the finish.
“I want to congratulate him”, added Quintana.
Colombian Nairo Quintana is set to claim his second Grand Tour victory in Madrid on Sunday after fending off Chris Froome. “He really flew and got a better time than we had anticipated”, Quintana said. “Riding against the greats like Froome and Alberto Contador gives this win so much more importance”.
Quintana even had the strength to accelerate away from Froome at the finish to claim 10th spot – his Team Sky rival sportingly applauding 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.
“He (Froome) started to attack very early on in the descents, but I didn’t have any problem in defending all the way to the final climb”, Quintana told Spanish TV station Teledeporte.
Froome also had to settle for second in the Vuelta after losing out to Juan Jose Cobo in his breakout tour in 2012 and Contador in 2014.
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Cummings – second in the 2008 and 2011 editions – finished eighth.
