Morgado sprints to victory in Asturias

Portugues conquered wet stage 2, Del Toro still leader in GC

A sprint in the rain gave Antonio Morgado his second victory as pro.

After the success obtained last Sunday in the Giro di Romagna, the Portuguese cyclist won stage 2 of the Vuelta Asturias, preceding Albert Torres (Movistar) and teammate Isaac Del Toro, who continues his leadership in the general classification.

The race, that started from Ribeira de Arriba and rolled for 200 km to Ribadesella on a course with one 2nd category climb and five 3rd category hills, the last one at 40 km to go, was controlled perfectly by UAE Team Emirates, that gave freedom to a five riders breakaway, before neutralizing that action at -20 km.

The solo attempt by Samuel Fernandez (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), was neutralised by the Emirati team, and set up the final sprint in which Antonio Morgado prevailed thanks to a powerful acceleration.

This is the 28th victory of the season for UAE Team Emirates, and tomorrow they will try to defend the leader’s jersey of Isaac Del Toro in the final stage at Benia de Onis-Oviedo (140 km): the main opponent will be Josè Manuel Diaz (Burgos-BH), who’s 3rd at 1’09”, while in second place there’s Del Toro’s mate Rafal Majka.

Morgado: “The race was long and the day cold and with a lot of rain. The team trusted me, and all my mates did a great performance in trying to give me the opportunity to win, so I tried to sprint exploiting a super good lead-out. I’m very happy”.

Stage 2 results

1.⁠ ⁠Antonio Morgado (UAE Team Emirates) 4h50’18”

2.⁠ ⁠Albert Torres (Movistar) s.t.

3.⁠ ⁠Isaac Del Toro (UAE Team Emirates) s.t.

General classification after stage 2

1.⁠ ⁠Isaac Del Toro (UAE Team Emirates) 9h36’18”

2.⁠ ⁠Rafal Majka (UAE Team Emirates) +1’09”

3.⁠ ⁠Josè Manuel Diaz (Burgos-BH) +1’16”