The Movistar rider Nairo Quintana wins La Vuelta 2016!

The british cycling superstar Chris Froome succeed only to lower the difference as Nairo Quintana wins La Vuelta 2016

La Vuelta a Espana 2016 is over. The epilog? First win of the Columbian from the Movistar team Nairo Quintana who has been in possession of the red jersey for almost 2/3 of the race. Whether this was an expected epilog is something that many cycling fans can now argue about. However all of you who bet on sports in Spain might not be that surprised since Quintana was being considerably favored by sportsbooks during the whole La Vuelta, especially in relation to the Tour d’France winner Chris Froome.

Yesterday’s race

The winner of yesterday race was the Danish Magnus Court Nielsen from Orica BikeExchange who finished the 104.8 km long rout from Las Rozas to Madrid in 2 hours 48 minutes and 52 seconds. This was the second win of Nielsen this year at La Vuelta, after he finished first on the 18th stage from Requena to Gandia, three days ago. Second was the Italian Bennati, while the third place went for Gianni Meersman who has also proved himself to be one of the top world class sprinters at this La Vuelta. Meersman and Nielsen are the only two cyclist that had two victories at La Vuelta 2016. Both of them won four out of the five flat stages during this Gran Tour.

As it was the case in the previous flat stages of La Vuelta the leaders in the overall classification, Quintana and Froome did not manage to finish among the top 15 cyclist on yesterday’s stage. However, as internet betting sites in UK note, the one who did took the advantage of this stage yesterday was the Columbian Esteban Chavez who succeed to retain the third place taken on Saturday from the Spaniard Alberto Contador from the team of Tinkoff.

The Quintana vs Froome aspects

Many were expecting that Froome will have a more aggressive race in the past two days but all that the British succeed in the end was to lower the difference between him and Quintana from the more or less constant 3 minutes minus to the one minute and 23 seconds in the end. The reasons for the win of the Columbian or the defeat of Froome can be find in many aspects.

What is certain, as online sportsbooks in Colombia claim, is that Quintana’s victory was well deserved. Although he suffered from allergies during the Tour, Quintana succeed to remain in a good shape during all stages at La Vuelta. Many would like to find the reasons for the victory in the fact that he started the tour considerably fresher than Froome. Unlike the British who had attended the Rio Olympics earlier, the Columbian from Movistar came more relaxed on the three weeks tour, and that certainly prvided him with more energy for the Tour.

Another reason is found in good strategy of the team and the difference that was made on the stage 15 when by an early attack Froome was left behind isolated and Quintana succeed to make a three and a half minutes difference. This difference as we saw, proved to be sufficient until the end of this year’s La Vuelta.

The victory on the Vuelta 2016 was a second Grand Tour victory for Quintana on the Grand Tours. He has previously won Giro d’Italia in 2014, and the new challenge that remains for him now does not demand special introduction: Tour d’France, here he comes…