Danny van Poppel (Team Sky) bounced back from an earlier crash to take a convincing victory in Melgar de Fernamenta on the opening stage of the Vuelta a Burgos. The Dutchman claimed only his second victory of the season by a clear margin over BMC’s Jempy Drucker and Etixx-QuickStep’s Gianni Meersman.
Team Sky had done much of the work in the closing kilometres of the stage to bring back the day’s break. However, they were nowhere to be seen as BMC brought the peloton under the flamme rouge, followed by Orica-BikeExchange. Instead, Van Poppel worked the sprint on his own, moving up the left of the bunch before jumping past Drucker as he came around the final corner.
Drucker had no answer for van Poppel’s acceleration to the line and the Team Sky rider had almost two bike lengths, even allowing for slowing to celebrate. Van Poppel crossed the line, arms aloft, with several huge tears down the left hand side of his skinsuit but looked none the worse for his contact with the tarmac. Unable to get changed before the podium ceremony, he stepped up to collect his stage winner’s prize and the race leader’s jersey with his bloody skin still showing through some gaping holes in the side of his shorts.
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The opening stage of the Vuelta a Burgos kicked off under cloudless skies in the municipality Sasamon, a town along the route of the famous Camino de Santiago. By bicycle, rather than donkey, the riders would head west on their pilgrimage to Melgar de Fernamental. The 158km route would take the peloton over just one classified climb, giving the sprinters a prime opportunity to strike lucky on the opening day.
A break was quick to form with seven riders jumping off the front of the bunch in the opening kilometres. The lucky riders were Maxim Belkov (Katusha), Julen Irizar (Euskadi Basque Country – Murias), Jacques Janse Van Rensburg (Dimension Data), Nicholas Schultz (Orica-BikeExchange), Pablo Torres (Burgos BH), Martijn Tusveld (Giant-Alpecin), Dries Van Gestel (Topsport Vlaanderen-Baloise).
With big open roads and a peloton intent on bringing this one home all together, the seven were given little more than two minutes’ advantage. With just 51 kilometres remaining, that had been sliced down to 1:20. They would eventually be swept up by the Team Sky-led bunch with 13 kilometres still to race. That opened the door for a few have-a-go hopefuls to try their luck but nothing stuck and it was gruppo compatto as the bunch approach the line.
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