Stage 7

The road

How it was won

1. 1108 km to go

   Nearly eight minutes, gladly given

   After several brutal days the peloton — Orica-GreenEdge above all — want a breather, and inside thirty kilometres the break is 7:50 clear. Nobody objects.

2. 218 km to go

   The first real mountain

   Eighteen kilometres from the finish the race hits the first major climb of this Vuelta with 5:33 still to make up. All eyes in the break are on Txurruka, on paper the best climber among them.

3. 34 km to go

   Aru's first blow of the race

   Dan Martin digs first and half the group answers him. Then Fabio Aru goes, and the answer stops coming: Chris Froome and Tejay van Garderen are both distanced inside the final two kilometres, and the Italian takes time out of everybody.

4. 41 km to go

   The collision on the final pitches

   Cousin, Koshevoy and Lindeman are still together on the last ramps of the climb to La Alpujarra when Cousin and Koshevoy touch. The Frenchman's race for the stage ends there, on the ground.

5. 5At the line

   Third time lucky for Lindeman

   Twice already in this Vuelta he has been in the day's break and got nothing. At 200 metres Bert-Jan Lindeman kicks once, and the third one is his.

The result