CYCLING – Team Bahrain Victorious rider Jakob Omrzel climbed into the top 10 of the general classification yesterday after the eight stage of the 81st La Vuelat a Espana – the third and final grand tour of the international cycling season.
The Slovenian moved up in the race’s overall ranking after finishing 41st in the 171-kilometre leg.
He was Bahrain Victorious’ third-best finisher yesterday, with his teammates and countrymen Matevz Govekar and Roman Ermakov leading the way for the kingdom’s squad.
Govekar just missed out on a top 10 finish with 12th. He was part of a bunch sprint to the finish, led by Bryan Coquard of Cofidis, who was the stage winner in three hours 47 minutes and six seconds. Ermakov followed in 26th as part of a trailing group that was 19 seconds behind Coquard.
Amongst the rest of the kingdom’s squad, Dutchman Mathijs Paasschens was right behind Omrzel in 42nd place, Hungarian Attila Valter came 58th, Colombian Santiago Buitrago was 111th, and Spaniards Pello Bilbao and Pau Miquel were 143rd and 144th, respectively.
With yesterday’s results, Omrzel also held on to second place in the best young rider classification, where he is behind only Oscar Onley of Netcompany Ineos.
Buitrago, on the other hand, rose one spot to fifth in the King of the Mountains standings.
This season’s 21-stage Vuelta a Espana continues today with stage nine covering 187.4km, part of the elite men’s road race’s total distance of 3,296.6km.
La Vuelta a Espana follows the other two grand tours of the season, which were the Giro d’Italia in May and the Tour de France last month.