CYCLING – TEAM Bahrain Victorious’s Pello Bilbao stayed within striking distance of the general classification’s (GC) top 10 yesterday after stage three in the 65th Itzulia Basque Country in Spain.
Bilbao ranked a solid 34th while teammate Antonio Tiberi was just ahead in 33rd at the end of the 152.8-kilometre leg, which started and finished in the municipality of Basauri.
Attila Valter came 68th for the kingdom’s squad, Roman Ermakov was 94th, Oliver Stockwell 97th, and Rainer Kepplinger 102nd, while Alberto Bruttomesso did not finish.
With yesterday’s results, Bilbao remained 13th on the GC midway through the six-stage elite men’s road race. He is just over half-a-minute from breaking into the top 10 but is nearly four minutes from overall leader Paul Seixas of Decathlon CMA CGM Team.
Ermakov climbed one spot to 14th on the best young rider rankings, also led by Seixas.
In this year’s Itzulia Basque Country, the peloton will cover a total of 810.1km from Bilbao to Bergara, tackling a total of 16,404m of climbing.
The race continues today with stage four, set to cover 167.2km while starting and finishing in the Spanish town of Galdakao.
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