After yesterday's more eventful than anyone expected stage, we are back into the terrian that people expect events - mountains!
Madrazo gained 43 cheap seconds on the likes of Contador, Intxausti, Sella etc. yesterday, which puts him in a very comfortable position in this years race. Still 10 stages have gone by and the dominent team of the race have yet to take a stage win, worse one of their three highly placed GC riders David Arroyo lost time yesterday.
It's not the best of weather in the Pyrenees, though despite this and the parcours that show we have two 2nd category climbs, 1 3rd category climb and the mountain top finish on the Col de Pal we get wave after wave of attacks early doors.
The eight riders here are Egoi MartÃnez de Esteban Leopold König Aleksej Kunshin Christoph Mai Philip Deignan Thomas Frei Thomas Bontenackels Michael Faerk Christensen
Santander look all business however, as they did in the early mountains in the race.
Five riders chase on they are Joost Posthuma Simon Zahner Egoi MartÃnez de Esteban Alex Ardila Cano
and Kevin De Weert
It's interesting to see lots of teams with relatively high GC hopes such as Proximus Trek, Webeffect, Jack Wolfskin, UBS, Cafe de Colombia, Pendletons, Wiggle and Pearl Adidas send riders forward with such big GC hopes.
A team without any real GC hopes are Carmeuse, with the break fully establishing themselves Óscar Solis
attacks across solo.
Wanting to rival Solis for the wacky mid stage MTF stage attack Konstantin Siutsou
tries to get the Pendletons jersey's noticed.
Solis is well placed to move forwards on the King of the Mountains competition and reels in the breakaway in time for the opening 3rd Category climb.
He takes the prime at the top ahead of Ardila Cano and Mai, this moves Solis to 24 KoM points putting him 2 points behind joint leaders Madrazo and Sella.
Bad news for Sella though as Vitor Rodrigues
crashes on the descent of this 3rd cat climb.
We move onto the first of the two second category climbs which is measured at 14.5km averaging 7%, meaning it is quite a tough one for a 2nd cat. Christenson is soon dropped by the break who are still ahead of a lone Siutsou.
Santander are moving things along now keeping the break with several half decent climbers in at a distance of about six minutes.
60km to go and 6km from the top the lead 12 still have a minute on Siutsou who has overtaken Christenson. The pack are measured at 5.30 with riders like the green jersey Michael Van Stayen
now dropped.
Vesuvio decide to try and mix things up a bit as Mwangi Samwel
and Maxim Iglinski
put in a scintillating pace.
It's a move that surprises a few sleeping favourites as Stefan Denifl Jaroslav Popovych
and Alejandro Valverde
struggle to hold on.
It's not quite yet panic stations as the pace drops off again near the top and the favourites do get back on. It remains to be seen whether the named riders were just napping or are having a bad day.
Meanwhile Solis takes the provisional lead in the King of the Mountains comp attack near the top to take the full 16 points for winning a second category climb.
Siutsou is the Pendletons rider behind who has clearly caught the break and takes second, with Mai in third.
As the pack approaches the top we can see Santander in charge and like Vesuvio before they seem to have the hammer down looking to drop some of the favourites.
A quick head count and we can see all the main favourites bar Popovoch and Denifl clearly the earlier drop was an indication of their form. Both riders are having to work hard here as their hopes of decent GC rides are falling.
Santander have taken their cue from Vesuvio and produced that super team strategy here, however they suffer some bad luck on the descent of this climb as David Arroyo
falls badly.
It's not good news for the veteran 'road captain' seen as the voice of experience in the team as he looks like he is struggling.
A check on the time gaps then before the last two climbs of the day.
All the top eleven on GC are present but behind we have the riders in 12th through to 15th in a group of 14 riders at 4 minutes: Costagli, Popovich Ji, Menchov Stefan Denifl Iker Camaño Kvasina, Claerebout Michael Rogers Dees, Morobito David Arroyo Walter Pedraza
As we close on the second of the two 2nd category climbs a sudden upping of the pace catches Sella and Abal out as they drop back with a Santander rider Valls and former breakaways Martinez, Posthuma and Zahner.
It's a careless moment for Sella and Abal as the favourites group catch up with the breakaway.
Rather disappointingly for Sella and Abal instead of pushing on to catch the leaders they seem unable to get near the Santander power and drop back to the Popovich, Menchov, Denifl, Pedraza group.
This is the sort of GC scalp that some riders have been hoping for as Festina send Serpa and Vesuvio send Iglinski forward to keep that pace high.
No sign of Solis to attack for points, he is struggling under this GC battle type pace by Vesuvio/Festina/Santander. Instead Gomez Marchante makes a move for mountains points.
He takes the climb to move onto 29 KoM points with Serpa crossing in second place. But the big news is that the front group has been whittled down to just ten survivors.
The names: Serpa, Contador, Valverde, Tenorio, Madrazo, Plaza, Gomez Marchante, Intxausti, Machado and Iglinski.
Samwel bridges to his team leader on the descent along with the battling Siutsou. It's a slightly surprising situation with Santander currently trumped by three Vesuvio's, there is two Festina's there too.
As they start to climb the final climb of the Col de Pal the lead 12 riders have a gap of 90 or so seconds on the Sella group.
Sella's group is really down the bare bones that's Sella, Denifl, Popovich, Abal, Valls and Pedraza.
Menchov is having a really tough time, he hasn't looked anywhere near the front at any occasion today and is some four minutes down on the lead group. Arroyo is down at nine minutes, hopes of a recovery today have been dashed by that crash.
Samwel and Siutsou drop back again as we approach the 10km to go point and Intxausti is sitting at the back of the lead group with Samwel. Suddenly Vesuvio do not look as strong, meanwhile Gomez Marchante and Tenorio are the riders that lead us through.
The chasing Sella group continue to up the ante, they realise that there is no big pace in the front group and as mainly Sella himself raises the pace Pedraza drops back with one of the Santander's it looks like Lopez Garcia.
Sella is now attacking his followers, but Popovich and Abal are battling to stay with the Italian who could be rescuing things for them.
Indeed the trio are tantalisingly close to making the catch to the lead group currently being paced by Serpa.
Abal and Popovich cannot quite keep on Sella's wheel and Denifl battles his way back to them.
Up front Sella is moving past a struggling Plaza, the Jack Wolfskin rider has been with the leaders for most of the stage today no excuses here he is not good enough.
Santander have been quiet, even looking vunerable on this day, but Madrazo himself has never really looked bothered. Noticing that his teammate Tenorio is starting to struggle he realises now is the time to make his mark. With everybody looking like they are on their limits he attacks hard with 6km of climbing left.
Contador briefly looks to follow but shakes his head sinks into his saddle and allows Madrazo to build a gap.
It's the moment I guess that Spain has been waiting for, the big stage racing superstar is making his big moment here. He settles into a rhythm, the question is can he maintain this?
Sella has fought a rearguard action, having picked off Plaza he continues to go past the dropped riders like Samwel, Iglinski and now Tenorio and Gomez Marchante.
But as he picks the riders off the thinned favourites group continues to maintain a gap and Jose Serpa is doing a brilliant job dropping riders and keeping Madrazo in range.
Just Valverde, Machado, Intxausti and Contador are able to stick with Serpa, but as his surge fades Madrazo starts to move a bit further clear.
Finally with 3km to go, with Serpa spent Contador puts in his move.
Nothing from Intxausti, who seemed to be struggling at the 10km to go mark. He has clung on but now is really struggling as Machado and Valverde are moving clear of the Vesuvio rider.
Up front though Madrazo has pulled his gap out towards 50 seconds into the final kilometre. He is moving freely and seems perhaps as if his true climbing ability has been revealed with less support from his team.
He takes Santander's first stage win of this years Vuelta and perhaps a giant step towards taking overall victory.
Contador is second best to Madrazo again, his Festina teammate Serpa was superb today but he just cannot match Madrazo. Still he distance his podium rivals, Machado and Valverde between 25 and 30 seconds back. Intxausti grafts hard to stay to withing 15 seconds of these two ahead of Serpa.
Behind Serpa at just over two minutes to Madrazo is Sella, surely another grand tour is out of the window here as here.
Forty seconds behind Sella and finishing at 2.40 ish is Gomez Marchante and Tenorio, the UBS man perhaps wasting his strength to go for King of the Mountains points. Tenorio meanwhile did some work earlier in the category 2 climbs but could do little for Madrazo on the Col de Pal.
Another minute back is Plaza and Abal, Plaza just cannot hold the favourites as Abal lost out due to positioning.
He did attack Popovich in the finale, who is just having no joy here in Spain. His team produced a decent Time trial but the Ukrainian has not been able to up his game in the mountains.
Young Austrian Denifl finishes with Popovich, these GC riders ahead of Vesuvio duo Iglinski and Samwel who gave it all for their leader Intxausti. Pedraza and Menchov were further back, both were never in the hunt.
Arroyo meanwhile finishes a whopping THIRTY minutes down, clearly injured and worried about continuing in this years Vuelta - it's not all smooth sailing for Santander.
Stage results
It was a really tough day today, Menchov came in at 10.29 which just shows how the gaps opened up. Several time limit eliminations Roelandts in a group pretty lucky to survive.
Withdrawels: Dimitri Champion Caethoven, Aulas, Weylandt Butterfield, Abakoumov William Germán RodrÃguez Parra Kristof Vandewalle Vanderaerden, Hutarovich Tom Leezer Daniel Allonca Lang, Meyer, Wetterhall Marcel Kittel Óscar Avelino Yannick Stoltz
GC
Madrazo now pretty commanding in the lead of this race, with Contador moving to 2nd 29 seconds clear of Intxausti who hung as tough as he could. Machado is impressive, with Sella really having to fight to get back to the favourites and Valverde continues to repair the TTT damage. Plaza, Abal and Gomez Marchante seem to be in a battle for 6th best Spaniard behind Tenorio as Popovich moves to the best of the rest. Arroyo is down to 31st.
Points
As documented before, Roelandts was a shade lucky to survive the time cut, Cavendish even more so. Both will need to work hard again tomorrow to live to fight for that points jersey. Van Stayen looked more comfortable and retains the green jersey but Madrazo is just 19 points behind.
Mountains
Solis was perhaps a bit unlucky not have got a bit more for his move, Gomez Marchante could make an assault at this jersey now also. Madrazo though overhauls all leading this standing now.
Youth
Madrazo is undoubtably the king of the Santander trio of youngsters, meanwhile Denifl is just grafting away hoping for an overall top 10. He is possibly hoping that Tenorio will slip back as the race moves forwards.
Team
For a brief moment it seemed as if Vesuvio may actually hold the upper hand against the Arroyo less Santander. But Iglinski and Samwel faded in the finale and Santandre actually gained time, Festina are third best Dees and Morobito unable to make the kind of selection being made, but then again Serpa is doing an awesome job. Pearl and Webeffect did pretty average jobs for their leaders here, but their leaders rode well.
