Esteban Chaves is into the top ten on general classification at the Giro d'Italia for the first time in 2016 following the Roccaraso mountaintop finish where the Colombian climber finished seventh, taking time on some of his overall rivals. The Orica-GreenEdge rider finished ahead of riders such as Rigoberto Uran, Rafal Majka, Alejandro Valverde, Vincenzo Nibali, Mikel Landa and Ryder Hesjedal who are all expected to challenge for the podium in Turin.
While maglia rosa Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) extended his race lead and Jakob Fuglsang (Astana), Ilnur Zakarin (Katusha), Domenico Pozzovivo (AG2R La Mondiale) finished head of the 26-year-old, it was a successful start to the Giro's climber friendly stages as Chaves explained.
"First mountain day, hard day and some teams and people show their muscle in the final," Chaves said in the team’s backstage pass video. "I feel great, I arrived with the best guys, but this is obvious because the team always stays with me."
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Chaves praised the early work on the run in to the 18km climb by his teammates such as Sam Bewley, Michael Hepburn and Svein Tuft before being looked after by recent Spanish signings, Amets Txurruka and Ruben Plaza.
"The big guys in the beginning and the climbers in the final like Amets or Ruben or [Damien] Howson. The big guys like Bewley, Sveino, Heppy help me all the time," said Chaves, adding that the teams chrono specialists saved him crucial energy needed on the final climb to push past his rivals for seventh place behind stage winner Tim Wellens (Lotto Soudal).
"I feel like I am doing motor pacing always because I am behind Sveino, behind Sam. It's like 100 watts less, so it's watts I can use in the final and this is the result," said Chaves who won two stages of last year's Vuelta a Espana as he finished fifth overall.
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