Nelson Oliveira soloes clear of big break to win stage 13 in style

Oliveira broke clear of his fellow escapees on the descent of the third categorised climb of the day some 28 kilometres before the finish of the 178km stage from Calatayud in northeastern Spain.

With team-mates Ruben Plaza and Valerio Conti able to hinder the chase, the 26-year-old Portuguese national time trial champion used his against-the-clock TT skills to open up a sizeable gap before coming home to secure the professional first win of his career.

Frenchman Jules Simon (Cofidis) edged Ireland's Nico Roche (Team Sky) for second place as the remainder of the break crossed the line after a slightly uphill finish one minute behind Oliveira.

Italy's Gianluca Brambilla (Etixx-QuickStep) and France’s Romain Sicard (Europcar) both moved into the top ten after starring in the break, which came home almost four minutes ahead of the peloton.

Red jersey Fabio Aru (Astana), the Italian race leader, finished safely in the pack 4:48 down on Oliveira to retain his 27-second advantage over Spanish veteran Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) ahead of three tough days in the mountains.

Oliveira was one of an original group of three riders who broke clear some 30km into the stage to form a break whose numbers swelled to 24 riders on the second of three climbs.

“It was a strong break and we decided we wanted to be part of it,” said Oliveira’s Lampre-Merida team-mate Plaza, a stage winner in July’s Tour de France.

“It was the perfect piece of team strategy and the victory went to a very good rider and so it’s a great day for us.”

A fast start saw numerous attacks foiled before three riders – Oliveira, Sylvain Chavanel (IAM Cycling) and Yukiya Arashiro (Europcar) – managed to open up a gap ahead of the Cat.3 Alto Collado de Oseja.

Five more riders quickly joined the leaders while two separate groups of eight chasers extricated themselves from the peloton on the second climb of the day, the Cat.1 Alto de Beraton, with 115km remaining.

With the likes of Sky duo Nicolas Roche and Sergio Henao, British Tour de France stage winner Steve Cummings (MTN-Qhubeka), Dutch national champion Niki Terpstra (Etixx-QuickStep) and seasoned Italian climber Alessandro De Marchi (BMC) – as well as GC danger men Brambilla and Sicard – all involved, it was a strong 24-man entity that soon established a four-minute lead over the pack.

While the finish offered – at least on paper – the last chance for a victory for winless John Degenkolb ahead of the final stage to Madrid, the German’s Giant-Alpecin team took no part in the chase, leaving Aru’s Astana team-mates to monitor the gap.

On the Cat.3 Alto del Moncayo numerous riders tried their luck from the break, with Oliveira’s early dig matched by both Chavanel and De Marchi before the rest of the riders fought back.

Poland’s Pawel Poljanski (Tinkoff-Saxo) attacked half way up the climb to take maximum points and deny Spanish veteran Plaza a clean sweep (by crossing the previous two peaks in pole position, Plaza had moved into second place in the polka dot jersey standings behind compatriot Omar Fraile of Caja Rural).

Poljanski held a slender lead of 15 seconds going over the summit and was soon reeled in by his fellow escapees, who rode with an advantage of 4:30 over the peloton with 30km remaining.

The day’s winning move came when Oliveira sniffed out his opportunity moments after Poljanski had been brought to heel, the triple national time trial champion catching his colleagues by surprise by surging clear on the sweeping descent.

Oliveira’s gap had reached 45 seconds by the time the road flattened out with 15km remaining – and with two team-mates expertly thwarting any chances of a coordinated chase, Oliveira was able to dig deep all the way to the finish.

Spurred on by the encouragement of his animated directeur sportif Orlando Maini, Oliveira powered home in style, zipping up his jersey and punching the air as he crossed the line for his the biggest win of his career.

COMING UP: Three back-to-back summit finishes are on the horizon for the remaining riders, starting with Saturday’s 215km stage 14, which features two categorised climbs ahead of the HC mountain-top finish of the Alto Campoo.