Koen's report from the second weekend of the

During the past several days the Vuelta has not only been about riding mountain stages but also the huge transfers we have had to go to the start of a stage or after a stage. In particular during the last number of days we have not once had our evening meal before 10pm and due to that I have been unable to write more race reports. Today was the second rest day of the race, there is one week to the end of the Vuelta but definitely there should be several great opportunities for me to get into a leading group and go for a stage win.

The last few days were real mountain stages with the latter two finishing on ascents. I would have preferred to have been present in the breakaway groups but I wasn't the only one who wanted to do that so it was a case of gambling on a particular group getting away and unfortunately that didn't work out for me during the last few days. Luckily I still feel very good so it should definitely work out on one of the final days.

A real high point of the Vuelta so far was climbing the Angliru. It is a mythical climb where I really needed the 34x28 gear ratio. Whereas I couldn't imagine before hand that I would actually enjoy the climb, I actually did. My legs were fairly good and the hoards of people at the side of the road made it easier, especially as here and there they gave me a push. On many points of the climb I was going at a speed of only 9km/h, it is really hard to really sum up how steep that climb is!

Tomorrow will be pretty much a flat stage but firstly I will have a good rest today!

Greetings, Koen