Blog - Vuelta a España

The three Grand Tours (Tour de France, Vuelta a España, Giro d'Italia) more popular than ever on the web?

With the Internet becoming more and more interactive and multimedia, the information about cycling races becomes much easier to find and much quicker available. This means that cycling races, and more specifically the three Grand Tours - the Tour de France, the Vuelta a España and the Giro d'Italia - should thus also become more and more popular on the Internet.

In this article you can get an idea of the popularity of the three Grand Tours, based on data from the most popular search engine in the world, Google.

Unless mentioned otherwise the data mentioned in this article concern the period 2004 until 2009.

The popularity of the three Grand Tours

Vuelta a España 2010: the 75 year old Tour of Spain's official route unveiled

In 2010 the Vuelta celebrates its 75th anniversary. From Saturday 28 August 2010 until Sunday 19 September 2010 the riders will go from Sevilla to Madrid in about 3,337.9 kilometers.

This 65th edition starts with a spectacular team time trial by night in the streets of Sevilla in the South of Spain.

In this article you can find all details of the route (the recorrido oficial), the stage profiles and the particularities of the Tour of Spain 2010!

The particularities of the Vuelta a España 2010

Tyler Farrar wins the 11th stage of the Tour of Spain, Alejandro Valverde still in gold

In presence of Miguel Indurain the riders started this morning from Murcia for a 200 kilometer stage towards Caravaca de la Cruz. On their way to the finish line they had to climb a first category mountain around kilometer 50, the Alto Collado Bernejo, and a second category mountain at about 50 kilometers from the finish, the Alto Campo de San Juan.

David de la Fuente (Fuji-Servetto) took over the jersey for the best climber from David Moncoutié (Cofidis) yesterday, so a battle for this jersey was planned during this stage. One rider didn't start today: after the abandon of his younger brother a few days ago it was now up to Frank Schleck (Saxo Bank) to abandon.

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Gustavo Veloso wins the 9th stage of the Vuelta, Alejandro Valverde brings the golden jersey home!

This second mountain stage almost seemed to become a carbon copy of yesterday's stage ... except that today one of the riders of the leading group, Gustavo Veloso (Xacobeo Galicia), continued till the end for the stage win and that it was not Damiano Cunego but Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d'Epargne) who started the pursuit in the last few kilometers. Thanks to his third place in this stage he takes over the golden leader's jersery which he gets to wear tomorrow during the stage in Murcia ... close to his home!

The 9th stage of the Vuelta a España 2009 was again a difficult mountain stage. After yesterday's stage the riders didn't get must rest because today's stage again proposed 7 mountains to climb: right from the start they started the climb to the top of the Alto de Onil, a third category mountain (altitude: 1000 m) which had never been part of a Vuelta stage before. After a long descent they continued with the climb of the Alto de Tibi, s ...

Damiano Cunego (Lampre-NGC) wins the first mountain stage in the Vuelta 2009

Pieter Weening (Rabobank) told it several times the last few days: he was eager to get into the mountains. They finally arrived today with no less than 8 climbs and the Dutch rider showed that he was indeed waiting for it! Indeed, he was part of the leading group of the day. Finally it's Damiano Cunego (Lampre-NGC) who wins this mountain stage.

The description of the stage

Fabian Cancellara (Saxo Bank) also wins the second time trial in the Vuelta 2009 and takes back the golden jersey!

When I said a few days ago that the days look alike in this Vuelta 2009, I didn't expect this to be the case as well for today's stage. However, in this second stage in the form of an individual time trial the weather conditions were as bad as in the first stage: it was raining all day long close to Valencia and there was quite a lot of wind as well. The rain did however, in contrast to the first stage, won by Fabian Cancellara (Saxo Bank) in Assen in The Netherlands, not give an advantage to some riders since all riders did their time trial in the same bad weather conditions; however the wind might have played a more important role.

In this solo effort, Fabian Cancellara (Saxo Bank) was again the best rider today on the 30 kilometers around Valencia, beating David Millar with 32 seconds.

After a first best time for the Dutch rider Lars Boom (Rabobank), it was up to the French rider Christophe ...

Borut Bozic (Vacansoleil) wins the 6th stage of the Tour of Spain (Vuelta)

The sixth stage of the Tour of Spain was 176,8 kilometers long and connected Xàtiva to ... Xàtiva. Indeed, both the start and the finish were in the same city!
This stage ended up in a final sprint which was quite easily won by the Slovenian rider Borut Bozic (Vacansoleil Pro Cycling Team).

The sixth stage: Xàtiva > Xàtiva

Tour of Spain 2009 : André Greipel (Columbia HTC) wins again and takes the leader's jersey

In my article about the riders who participate in the Tour of Spain and their numbers I said that Columbia HTC without Mark Cavendish would probably not be able to get the 6 stage wins the team got in the Tour of Italy and the Tour de France.
I also said that the team could however count on another sprint professional with the German rider André Greipel. Today this rider proved that his team took the right decision by selecting him for the Vuelta since he won his second stage in this year's Vuelta today and also took the golden leader's jersey!

The first stage win for André Greipel in this Tour of Spain was not really the result of a massive sprint but the German rider showed today that in the case of a massive sprint he can also win stages just like his team mate Mark Cavendish.

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The Vuelta a España leaves The Netherlands after the stage victories of Greg Henderson and André Greipel (Columbia HTC), Fabian Cancellara still in gold

The days pass in the Vuelta and the days look alike ...

Indeed, both yesterday and today there was a leading group with the Dutch rider Lars Boom (Rabobank) and both stages would normally have finished in a massive sprint. A short summary of these two stages ...

Third stage: Zutphen > Venlo (189,7 km)

Gerald Ciolek (Milram) wins the sprint for the second stage of the Vuelta a España 2009

Today the second stage of the Tour of Spain took place on the Dutch roads between Assen and Emmen over a total distance of 203,7 kilometers.
Immediately in the first kilometer 5 riders escaped from the peloton: Francisco José Martinez Perez (Andalucia Cajasur), David Garcia Da Peña (Xacobeo Galicia), Tom Leezer (Rabobank), Lieuwe Westra (Vacansoleil Pro Cycling Team) and Dominik Roels (Milram). These riders managed to get a maximum gap of 7 minutes but at about 40 kilometers from the finish this gap was reduced to only 2 minutes.

At 28 kilometers from the finish the riders had to pass a paved zone of about one and an halve kilometers and in that zone Francisco José Martinez Perez could not follow the 4 others who at that time had a gap of only 30 seconds on the peloton.

A few kilometers further the Dutch rider Lieuwe Westra attacked alone, probably to honour his father who he lost a few days before the star ...