Volta a Catalunya (st. 5)

Costa Rican allrounder from Movistar Team caught with less than 10km remaining on his training roads near Barcelona, as Schachmann (BOH) wins from the escape; Quintana remains attentive, takes 8th at pursuit group's sprint.

Max Schachmann (BOH) crowned in Sant Cugat del Vallès -end of stage five in the 2019 Volta a Catalunya- a long breakaway similar to the one which saw him coming victorious with a similar plan in 2018. The German took advantage of his presence into a very strong, early four-man move including Andrey Amador (Movistar Team), who raced today on roads quite close to his European residence for almost the whole year in La Garriga, Barcelona.

Amador, who followed the flurry of attacks in a very lively first hour of racing alongside Carlos Verona, stayed as lead of the race until 11km to go, when Schachmann profited from one of the small kicks uphill near the end to launch an acceleration leading him to victory and ruining his companions’ chances. Andrey, Bert-Jan Lindeman (TJV) and Tejay van Garderen (EF1) were caught by the sprinters’ teams with 8km left.

The Movistar Team’s main references rode with much attention, especially Nairo Quintana, who didn’t miss any splits into the bunch at the end and finished in 8th place at the bunch sprint. The Boyacá native remains in 4th spot overall, with Marc Soler in 10th, before the weekend’s stages: one with crosswinds danger to Vila-seca on Saturday, then the final, hilly eight laps around Montjuïc on Sunday.

2019 Settimana Coppi e Bartali stage three – results

Cover picture (c): Photo Gomez Sport