Tommaso Bessega close to the victory on the Circuito Montañés

The Circuito Montañés travelled to Villasana de Mena making an exception among its stages on Cantabrian lands. The stage seemed to be designed for a possible sprint finish despite its broken profile with three ascents to the Alto del Carel and multiple steep slopes. Tommaso Bessega tried to repeat his victory and finally finished second.

The race started with high temperatures and the wind threatening at some points of the course. Soon a breakaway of three riders was formed and, kilometres later, five riders were the protagonists of the longest attack of the day. The maximum distance would slightly exceed three minutes halfway through the day, but the work of the leader’s team would reduce the gap. In the last few laps and with the Carel (3rd) as the main protagonist, the peloton raised the pace a lot and ended up neutralising the breakaway. Everything seemed to point to a mass finish in Villasana de Mena.

Despite the attacks in the final moments to try to break up the peloton, the race reached the finish line compactly and Tommaso Bessega sprinted to a sensational second place.

“I value the result very positively. We are racing this Circuito Montañés as if they were one-day classics. Today the best option was Tommaso and we had the idea that no big breakaway would go away to control the race, but it wasn’t like that and Laboral Kutxa took the lead. On the last lap we wanted to increase the pace, but the race itself was coming fast. The four riders in front did a good job and Tommaso was able to take second place”, explained Miguel Gómez, director of the under-23 team after finishing the stage in Villasana de Mena.