Österreich-Rundfahrt (st. 6)

Petrov (TCS) escapes to Movistar Team's solidness in Dobratsch climb, with Dayer Quintana in 2nd place and 6th overall as Javi Moreno jumps a place up in the GC for 2nd before the decisive ITT

Picture (c): Klaus Titzer – Österreich-Rundfahrt

Movistar Team has come about to crown an already satisfactory Tour of Austria with a second victory to add to Dayer Quintana’s brilliant success in the Kitzbüheler Horn last Tuesday. The Colombian rider was the strongest of the GC contenders today atop of the Category-1 Dobratsch climb in Villach, after 172 km with another two demanding cols in the Radstädter Tauern (Cat-1) and the Turracher Höhe (Cat-1). However, the younger of the Quintana brothers was beaten by one of the members of the original break: Russian Evgeni Petrov (TCS), who held off the charge by twenty-two seconds.

The 16km final ascent -at almost 8% gradient- had additional excitement on the struggling by the race’s leader, Peter Kennaugh (SKY), who was dropped by the telephone squad’s main GC chance Javi Moreno, along with Dayer and Trek’s Riccardo Zoidl and Oliver Zaugg. The Andalusian rider, who started the day with a 40-second deficit, was close to reaching glory, but his rival was able to bounce back and even leave the Spaniard behind, while Dayer sticked to the yellow jersey and overcame him by 2″ at the finish. The brave effort did pay off for Moreno, who overtook Caruso (CAN) to become 2nd in the GC, with two other Blues in the overall top-ten: Quintana (6th) and Eros Capecchi (8th.)

1’02” will be the gap between the Brit and the Spaniard before Saturday’s decisive TT around the Neusiedler lake in Podersdorf (24km), where the Movistar riders -leading the teams’ classification by almost five minutes- hope to confirm the great results obtained in the last few days.