Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) took his first victory since fracturing his kneecap at the 2017 Tour de France, winning stage 2 of the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana in Albuixech after he went on the attack with the Astana pair of Jakob Fuglsang and Luis Leon Sanchez on the final climb of the stage and broke Team Sky’s grip on the race.
Valverde led out the sprint to beat Sanchez, with Fuglsang just behind. Giovanni Visconti (Bahrain-Merida) led home the chasers at 19 seconds, with Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) taking fifth. Valverde also took the race lead ahead of Friday’s 30.5km team time trial between Benitatxell and Calpe. He leads Sanchez by 4 seconds, with Fuglsang third at 6 seconds. Wout Poels (Team Sky) is fourth at 29 seconds.
Valverde needed surgery and two months off the bike to recover from his terrible crash at the Tour last July. For many riders, including those much younger than the 37-year-old Spaniard, it would have marked the end of their career. Instead Valverde recovered quickly, hit the gym and stacked up 6,000km of training even before the end of the 2017 season so he could make a rapid return to competition in 2018.
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“I'm really happy, it was my first victory after the injury,” Valverde said immediately after hugging his teammates and thanking Fuglsang for working in the attack.
“I have to congratulate my team and Astana, we worked together, it was brilliant. Luis Leon Sanchez is a friend great too. He wanted to win but so did I. In training, I felt good but you never know until you're racing. I was good in Mallorca, but I was careful because the roads were wet. I didn't think I'd get victory here though.”
Valverde was happy to have earned 19 seconds on many of his rivals before the key 30.5km tram time trial to Calpe.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest Race Results http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/volta-a-la-comunitat-valenciana-2018/stage-2/results
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