Critérium du Dauphiné (st. 6)

Catalan's courage -supported by a fantastic Héctor Carretero, all day into the break- leads young Movistar Team rider to 8th overall.

The bravery of Marc Soler and Movistar Team was evident again at Saturday’s toughest stage in the 2018 Critérium du Dauphiné, 110km from Fronténex to the Cat-1 climb of La Rosière after three demanding, previous climbs to Bisanne (HC), Pré (HC) and the Cormet de Roselend (Cat-2).

Bouncing back from an ill-timed mechanical which took him out of the GC group for most of the Roselend ascent, the 24-year-old Catalan climber later rejoined the biggest GC names into the descent and even dropped them back with an attack, 12km before the finish. Soler took advantage in his move of the prior, early action by a fantastic Héctor Carretero, part of the 27-man move almost from the start of the race.

Marc and Héctor’s action was caught with 6km to go, the group of favourites unsuccessfully pursuit stage winner Pello Bilbao (AST). Soler, who finished 1’45” back, improves his GC position one place again today -he now sits in 8th spot, 3’40” behind Geraint Thomas (SKY)- and dons the white jersey as under-26 leader, by just 9″ over Pierre Latour (ALM). One decisive mountain stage is still remaining in the Alpine race, 136km towards Saint-Gervais Mont-Blanc on Sunday, with big fireworks again expected.

REACTION / Marc Soler:

“I was feeling good in that final climb, and since we were basically bringing Héctor’s group back, I wanted to still take advantage of him being there to jump across, anticipate the moves that could happen in the GC group and get into a good position before the hardest part of the climb. I knew I could struggle on those slopes and wanted to stay as close as possible to the top contenders once they launched their final acceleration. Surely tomorrow will be another difficult, fast stage – hopefully we can keep this white jersey at the finish, but it won’t be easy at all. It’s been a tough race so far, so one doesn’t really know what to expect from his body in such situations. We’ll, of course, do our best.”

Picture (c): Luca Bettini / BettiniPhoto.net