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Di Luca wins Vuelta second stage Posted: Sunday September 08, 2002 1:22 PMALCOI, Spain (Reuters) -- Italian Danilo Di Luca, riding for the Saeco team, won the second stage of the Tour of Spain on Sunday, triumphing in a bunch sprint finish. Di Luca charged ahead in the final metres to win in three hours 39 minutes 35 seconds with German sprinter Erik Zabel second and Oscar Camenzind of Switzerland third. Spaniard Joseba Beloki of ONCE-Eroski, who finished seventh, retained the overall lead. But this year's Giro d'Italia winner Paolo Savoldelli lost touch with the main pack on a first category climb and trailed home over 16 minutes back. After a sluggish start, the 144.7 km stage from Valencia sprang into life on a third category climb called El Revolcat when Spaniard Oscar Sevilla spearheaded a four-man attack that was only caught with a kilometre to go. Sevilla was hampered, however, by the presence of race leader Joseba Beloki's team mate Jose Azevedo. He also got little help from the other two Spanish breakaways, Jazztel's Carlos Torrent and his own Kelme-Costa Blanca team mate Alejandro Valverde. Despite Sevilla working solidly on the front and catching an earlier break formed by Spaniards David Etxebarra and Benjamin Noval, their lead never broke 20 seconds and the Kelme leader finally threw in the towel with 900 metres left to race. "It wasnt really an attempt to gain time on general classification," explained Sevilla, who finished second in the 2001 Vuelta. "What I really wanted to do was to win the stage for Kelme-Costa Blanca, because the sponsors are from this region." Di Luca charged ahead in the final metres with sprinter Zabel finishing second over a bike length back and former World Champion Camenzind third. "Having seen the finish when the peloton went through Alcoi the first time, I thought I might have a chance because it was uphill for the last 400 metres," said Di Luca. "However, there were a lot of attacks in the final 15 kilometres and when Acqua & Sapone started working so hard for Mario Cipollini, and succeeded in bringing back Sevilla's move, things didn't look so good. "But then when Cipollini cracked I decided to push harder and go all out in the finale," added Di Luca, winner of this year's Giro di Veneto. The big loser on the day, 2002 Giro winner Savoldelli, lost touch with the main pack on the first category climb of Portillol. The Italian finally finished over 16 minutes back in a group of some two dozen riders. Before Sevilla's attack the stage had only been livened up with a two-man move by German Nieto of Spain and Frenchman Mederic Clain, which began after 11 kms of racing. Nieto and Clain reached a maximum lead of 11 minutes after 40 kms before the slow-moving peloton, headed by Mapei-Quick Step and Telekom, began to reduce their advantage. The two were finally reeled in on the Revolcat climb with 18 kms left to race, shortly before Sevilla launched his defiant challenge on the winding descent to the finish. |
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