Tour of Beijing (st. 3)

Jesús Herrada takes 8th at diminished bunch sprint in Qiandiajian; 50 riders in the main field, including workforce Visconti, Rui Costa and Beñat Intxausti, the latter two now within top ten overall

The Movistar Team riders started placing their cards on the table during stage three of the 2013 Tour of Beijing, a lumpy parcours of 170km between Yanqing and Qiandiajian with up to seven categorized climbs. After gaining bonus seconds with Rui Costa and Beñat Intxausti at the intermediate sprints -the duo now sitting in 7th and 8th overall respectively, 19 seconds off the leader’s jersey-, the boys directed by José Luis Jaimerena and José Luis Laguía showed offensive manners in the finale, controlling the moves with Intxausti, Jesús Herrada and Andrey Amador, before Giovanni Visconti set up a launching platform into the last climb -Huang Tu Liang (Cat-3)- for his team-mate Rui Costa.

The attack by the Portuguese rider was countered by World time trial champion Tony Martin (OPQ), the last of the courageous before getting caught by a short, 50-rider peloton including Costa, Visconti, Intxausti and Jesús Herrada, who progressed into the sprint to take 8th behind back-to-back winner Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ). The Frenchman will depart tomorrow in the red jersey for the decisive stage of the event, the fourth and penultimate day of the competition over 151km and a mountain-top finish in the famous Great Wall at Mentougou (nearly 13km at 5.7% average.)