Stage 11

The road

At the start

Two seconds, and the road to Andorra

Joaquim Rodríguez leads his home Vuelta by two seconds from Igor Antón and four from Vincenzo Nibali, having taken the jersey with a pair of bonus seconds at an intermediate sprint. Today is the longest stage of the race, 211 kilometres to the ski station at Vallnord-Pal, and the first summit finish — a steady drag built for coach traffic that may open no great gaps, but will show who came here for red.

How it was won

1. 1151 km to go

   Two men, fifteen minutes

   Gilbert takes the first intermediate sprint and the peloton exhales; six kilometres later Johann Tschopp and Mikaël Cherel go, and neither of them threatens anything. By the feed zone they have close to fifteen minutes.

2. 250 km to go

   Katusha and Rabobank close it

   With fifty kilometres left the lead is under ten minutes and falling fast, Katusha riding for the red jersey and Rabobank burying themselves for Menchov — who will not be there when it matters.

3. 310 km to go

   Thirty seconds at the foot

   A field of about fifty hits the ten-kilometre climb to Andorra with the break barely half a minute up. Fofonov crosses to the leaders, Cherel cracks, and Katusha swallow the lot with seven kilometres to go.

4. 45 km to go

   Mosquera detonates it

   Xacobeo put two riders on the front where the gradient bites, and then Ezequiel Mosquera goes. Only Rodríguez and Nibali get onto it. Rodríguez is weaving across the road within a few hundred metres; Nibali holds on to 2.5 kilometres from the line and then he too is gone, and the Spaniard is alone on the mountain.

5. 52 km to go

   Antón's second wind

   Antón could not answer the attack at all. Then, somewhere on the last three kilometres, he finds something: past Rodríguez, past Nibali, up to Mosquera's wheel — and under the red kite he kicks again.

6. 6At the line

   Antón back in red

   He takes it by three seconds from a desperate Mosquera, with Tondo third at ten. Rodríguez loses nearly a minute and drops to fourth; Nibali concedes 23 seconds and is second overall, 45 back.

The result