Dan Martin has taken a fantastic stage win and captured the race lead on the first day in the mountains in Catalunya.
By Brian Canty
Dan Martin has taken his most significant win for 2½ years; storming to a marvellous victory on stage 3 of the Volta A Catalunya.
The Etixx-QuickStep man crossed the line at the summit finish to La Molina with two seconds to spare over runner-up Alberto Contador (Tinkoff) with Frenchman Roman Bardet (Ag2r La Mondiale) rounding out the podium.
A relieved and exhausted Martin threw his hands up in the air as he came over the whitewash and he was given further cause to celebrate when he soon learned he had taken the race lead.
He now leads the general classification in the WorldTour race by six seconds from the aforementioned Contador, with Bardet a further two seconds back.
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It’s almost three years to the day since Martin won that famous stage in Catalunya, a race he regards as his home event.
And given the amount of bad luck he’s had since then, today’s win clearly shows he’s back to his best.
If he was something of an underdog in 2013, Martin certainly didn’t carry that tag into this week’s race, given his propensity to win on the hardest of terrain.
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But today’s win is up there with anything he’s done in his career to date.
The top 10 on the stage – and indeed the overall - is a who’s who of world cycling.
And just some of those who had no answer for Martin today were Esteban Chaves (Orica GreenEdge), Chris Froome and Geraint Thomas (Team Sky), Tejay Van Garderen and Richie Porte (BMC Racing) and Nairo Quintana (Movistar).
Martin has already won this year; in his debut race, the Volta A Comunicat Valenciana.
But it was October 2014 when he last won a 'big one', that being the Tour of Lombardy.
Today’s stage was a 172 kilometre trek from Martin’s adopted home of Girona to the ski station at La Molina.
There were four cat 1 climbs, the last of which was to the ski station.
Tomorrow’s stage is another monstrous one with the riders set to tackle a 172 kilometre stage from Baga to the summit finish of Port Aine.
There are four climbs; an early category three followed by a hors categorie, a category one and another hors categorie.
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