Vuelta Review

So the final Grand Tour of the season is over, with almost a great result for British cycling and Team Sky - 13 seconds being all that separated Chris Froome (raised in Kenya to British parents and riding now under a British licence and for a British team) and a totally shocking overall win - having said that, Cobo did a great job of defending a very small advantage over the last few days, including when Froome attacked on the Angliru.

Wonder if Sky are kicking themselves now for the stage where Froome lost about 30s after being asked to do the domestique work for Wiggins on a stage finish Cat 1 climb (Froome was ahead of WIggins at the time).

Some great racing and some absolutely farcical organisation - second-last day, an intermediate sprint point was moved during the stage, and a few days before a stage finish (a potential bunch sprint at that) was disrupted when riders arrived at a roundabout only about 500m from the line and didn't know which way to go, resulting in several riders going the wrong way (the marshall had gone for a cup of coffee).

Having been a bit dubious in the past over the Vuelta's decision to have shorter stages, I was pleased to see a worthy Grand Tour. I enjoyed it very much and was impressed with the coverage on the Freeview ITV4.

The situation you describe was the classic problem of etiquette/team members' status during the stage. Nice to see Foome's loyalty to his leader!
It maybe should have been obvious to the manager by then that Cobo is a mighty tough little nut as well as a mountain goat and should have let Froome rip but...Eso Es La Vida.

Re the organisation...welcome to the Latin way of life! Overall, though, it didn't spoil a great race.

"Re the organisation...welcome to the Latin way of life! Overall, though, it didn't spoil a great race."

But even the Italians manage to have a better organised event...

The short and explosive stages do seem to have re-invigorated the Vuelta though - only problem is it necessitates some long transfers if the race is to cover the mountains in both the south and north of the country. Good that the political situation is now such that the Basque Country can be included in the route again.