Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil wins the opening stage of the Tour of Basque Country
Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil of Team Movistar joined the 2012 winning club after his outstanding performance during the opening stage of the Tour of Basque Country.
The Spaniard kept his head straight during the 153 kilometre tour opener in Guenes and overcame the race favourites to grab his first victory of the season.
He finished the race in a fastest time of 3 hours, 57 minutes and 44 seconds to receive the honours.
Wout Poels of Team Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling finished at the second position.
Fabian Wegmann of Team Garmin-Barracuda, Daniele Ratto of Team Liquigas-Cannondale and Arthur Vichot of Team FDJ-Big Mat achieved the next three spots.
While commenting on the victory Rojas noted, "I wasn’t expecting to race here because I had suffered a serious crash last week at Gent-Wevelgem".
"I still have much pain in my back and was really doubtful about taking the start or not".
“Eventually we decided to come here, especially as a preparation before next week to help Alejandro [Valverde] in the Ardennes, and... look what happened. When you don’t expect it, you win”.
Rojas claimed the top point’s classifications with a total number of 25 points in his pocket.
Wout Poels and Fabian Wegmann claimed the second and the third positions, with 20 and16 points, respectively.
David de La Fuente Rasilla of Team Caja Rural succeeded during the first six mountains of the stage, while Mikel Astarloza Chaurreau of Team Euskaltel – Euskadi dominated the final climb of the stage.
Davide Mucelli of Team Utensilnord Named won the first and the second sprints of the event while Robert Kiserlovski of Team Astana grabbed the final sprint.
Joaquin is now leading the overall classifications with Wout Poels and Fabian Wegmann at the second and the third positions.
The Spaniard is also leading the points and the mountains classifications, whereas Davide Mucelli occupied the first spot at the sprints classifications of the race.
The cyclists are now targeting the 165.7 kilometre stage between Guenes-Vitoria-Gasteiz on Tuesday.
Tour of Basque country is the ninth World Tour race of the season and the cyclists will travel across a gruelling six stages and the winner will be announced on Saturday, April 7, 2012.
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