Ruta del Sol: Bouhanni wins stage 2 in Cordoba

Nacer Bouhanni (Cofidis) won the second stage at the Vuelta a Andalucia Ruta Ciclista del Sol in Cordoba. A small main field reconnected on the run-in to the finish line after a challenging late-race climb. The Frenchman launched himself from the group to win the sprint ahead of Fabio Felline (Trek-Segafredo) and Ben Swift (Team Sky).

Bouhanni’s win bumped him up into the overall race lead but he still has the same time as sprinters Juan Jose Lobato (Movistar) in second, Raymond Kreder (Roompot- Oranje Peloton) in third and Swift in fourth.

The peloton climbed out of Palomares del Rio for the start of stage 2 at the Ruta del Sol and then descended toward the 14-km mark where they began a relatively flat trek. They faced one significant climb near the end of the 186.3km stage, passing over the Alto de Trassierras (163km) before descending to the finish line in Cordoba.

Similar to the previous day, a breakaway of four riders set off that included Reinier Honig (Roompot - Oranje Peloton), Pablo Torres (Burgos-BH), Ruben Pols (Topsport Vlaanderen – Baloise) and Aitor González (Euskadi Basque Country – Murias).

They picked up several minutes on the peloton but that gap was diminished once the race was on the day’s decisive ascent over Alto de Trassierras. Kanstantsin Siutsou (Dimension Data) made one big push on the climb, and although two riders tried to follow, they weren’t able to latch onto his back wheel, and he gained a handful of seconds.

Team Sky sent their riders to the front of the main field to keep Siutsou’s time gap in check at just over 20 seconds, which forced the field into an agonizing single file, and some riders to off the back. Siutsou pushed on through the ascent’s sweeping turns and seemed almost out of sight.

Cresting the summit, Siutsou blasted down the mountain’s fairly wide bends in the road, pushing his gears as fast as they could turn but he still only managed to maintain the 20 seconds he held up most of the climb.

Hemorrhaging more time on the descent, as the roads straightened out the peloton could see Siutsou just over 10 seconds ahead. Slowly riders at the tip of the single-file field began latching onto Siutsou’s move with roughly 12km to go.

Still on the long descent, and with remnants of the main field intact, they raced to the bottom with the stage win in sight. A massive attack came from Tim Wellens (Lotto Soudal), who was quickly joined by Dani Moreno (Movstar). Off the descent and pushing their speeds on the flat sections with 10km to go, the pair built a small lead but it diminished to nothing six kilometres from the finish line.

BMC took the reins at the front of the small front group in what looked to be the beginnings of sprint set-up. Team Sky and Movistar jockeyed for their positions but with only 18 riders in the group, it was a tough to negotiate.

That negotiating was made even more difficult when a second larger group reconnected with the front at roughly five kilometres out, swelling the field to roughly 50 riders, and allowing teams with multiple riders left to organise proper sprint trains.

It was Cofidis that had established the best team work with Christophe Laporte setting up Bouhanni perfectly for the stage win.

The peloton will take on stage 3’s 157km race from Monachil to Padul on Thursday.

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