Gerrans wins chaotic sprint in Catalunya

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A well-timed final acceleration netted Simon Gerrans (Orica-GreenEDGE) the victory in the small group bunch sprint that decided the second last stage of the Volta a Catalunya, whilst Dan Martin (Garmin-Sharp) finished safely in the front group and snatched a three second mid-stage time bonus to increase his overall lead to 17 seconds.

Gerrans was the only rider to take part both in Milan-San Remo and Catalunya - which started the following day - after a late night trek across southern France on Sunday. Six days later the Australian’s tough journey became more than worthwhile as he secured Orica-GreenEDGE’s ninth triumph of the season.

On a 178 kilometre stage run off at breakneck speed - finishing more than half an hour ahead of the fastest schedule - numerous attacks finally saw a break of eight go clear on the first category climb of Alt de Prades, two thirds of the way through the day’s racing. With danger men for the overall such as Egor Sillin (Astana) and Dani Navarro (Cofidis), both at less than three minutes overall, though, the gap never rose to more than 1 minute 30.

By the summit of the second climb of the day, the second category Alt de Lilla, the peloton - splintering fast thanks to the pace set down by BMC - had the eight riders well within their sight. Katusha’s Alberto Losada was first across the top of the climb by less than a dozen seconds on the main pack and on an ultra-fast, open descent, and with BMC continuing to lay down a fast pace, four kilometres from the finish the eight were finally reeled in.

Swinging into a sharp-lefthander for the final dash to the line, Gianni Meersman (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) looked set to claim his third sprint stage in five days. But Gerrans, starting well back, managed to overtake three riders in the last 100 metres and claim the day’s prize.

After taking four seconds on the top overall contenders on Friday thanks to his being in the right side of a late split, Dan Martin (Garmin-Sharp) continued to prise open his overall advantage a little more by taking a three second time bonus at kilometre 30’s hot spot sprint. He now leads on 2010 Volta winner Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) by 17 seconds.

Gerrans received the stage winner's prize from the parents of Xavier Tondo, the Catalan rider born in the finish town of Valls and who died in a freak accident in a garage in May 2011. The stage paid homage to Tondo - a winner of stages both in the Volta and Paris-Nice - with the finish outside the town’s sports stadium, named after him, and later that evening his biography El triomf de l’obstinació, [the triumph of stubborness] was presented in the town’s main theatre.

The Volta’s final stage on Sunday has a notoriously tricky finishing circuit of Montjuic in Catalonia’s capital, Barcelona. Last year in the Vuelta a España the rollercoaster roads of Montjuic park, tackled just once, saw Philippe Gilbert (BMC) and Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) burst clear of the peloton to snatch a few seconds advantage over the pack, with Gilbert claiming his first win of the season. This time round, with eight laps of the Montjuic circuit for the peloton, time bonuses on offer and the first four riders overall with less than a minute between them, a spectacular finale to the 2013 Volta is all but guaranteed.

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