Roberto Bou has made history in Skoda Titan Desert Morocco. The Aragonese cyclist leads the penultimate stage by being the fastest with a large advantage over the chasing group. To be more specific, he lasted 8 minutes and 38 seconds Sergio Mantecón and Josep Betalúwho completed the podium.
the one of Cannondale VAS Arabay It’s a machine from scratch. Already in the first section of the stage, in the dune area, he was far ahead of the rest, achieving a mid-day advantage of more than six minutes. Later, far from slowing down, he continued to increase the distance until completing the 99km stage in 3h, 12 minutes and 37 seconds. At the finish line, Bou was very happy because his grandfather passed away last week and he wanted to dedicate it to him.
“They have been some very hard days because I was closely linked to my grandfather. I know that he gave me the strength to achieve today and this is for him. We had two strategies and luckily mine was the good one. I chose one navigation and my team for the other. I know it’s hard to keep up with my pace but there are three chasers who can push, so I didn’t give up because I was comfortable. It’s not a miracle, it’s a matter of stubbornness“, explained to the media.
Looser and Blacksmith ran out of options
Konny Looser and Fran Herrero They were undoubtedly the great favorites to take the final victory but the penultimate stage turned out to be a disaster for them. the swiss of Kosner-Saltoki spent a terrible night vomiting because of a stomach flu and was unable to finish the stage. In the sands he was seen walking without exercising the rhythm he had shown until now.
For his part, the Spaniard suffered greatly in the two kilometers of sand. It fell and hit the head in addition to damaging part of the change system. To conclude, air leaked from the valve when he was recovering. The man from Segovia at least consoled himself with his teammate’s great victory: “The goal is for the team to be the winner and we are achieving that for the moment.”
In the absence of the last stage to finish, one that in principle does not give much change since it is only 70km, Bou leads the general with a margin of more than 13 minutes. Everything indicates that the thorn of being second and third in the 2017 and 2018 editions, respectively, will be removed. In another great performance, Betalú was second ahead of Fran, who at least kept the podium
Tessa Kortekaas is impressed and is the new leader
The Dutchwoman put in a superb performance, slipping to ninth place overall. Courtesy she was brutally superior to her rivals from the dune area and was the only woman capable of under four hours to complete the stage. He did it in three hours and 50 minutes. It took 22 minutes from Vera Looser and 32 to Ariadna Ródenas.
One from Namibia had the same problem as his partner, gastroenteritis, and he hadn’t eaten anything before the stage and immediately became very stagnant. Vera, unlike Konny, was able to finish the stage but he was exhausted and devastated by losing a race that had been in his bag since the beginning of Titan.
In the beating of this fifth stage, Tessa is the leader of the general with a difference very close to 10 minutes from Vera. Ródenas continues to close the provisional podium but is almost 40 minutes from the lead.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Robert Maynard, and I am a passionate journalist with experience in sports writing. For the last few years, I have been writing for Today Times Live. My main focus has been on sports-related stories and features. With my strong background in journalism and extensive knowledge of the industry, I am able to provide readers with well-crafted pieces that are both informative and engaging.
