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After a cunning victory in Tirreno-Adriatico, a similarly well-calculated last-minute attack by 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Stephen Cummings (168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Dimension Data) enabled the Briton to claim the stage 3 win ahead of the teeth of the peloton in the 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Vuelta al País Vasco on Wednesday.

Cummings tore out of the pack on the run-in to Lesaka with about 600 metres to go, and though the peloton was snapping at his heels all the way to finish, he managed to stay away to the line for victory. It was also a welcome win for Dimension Data after their narrow miss in the 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Scheldeprijs, where Mark 🌸Cavendish lost to Marcel Kittel (Etixx-QuiꦚckStep).

Having celebrated on the podium wearing the traditional, huge Basque beret that is given to stage winners in the race - “I’ve always wanted one of those,” he said afterwards with a grin - Cummings told a small group of reporters that “it was a really impo♔rtant win. This race means a lot to the people here, because it’s so difficult. It’s great to win here because the level’s so high.”

As Cummings observed, the intensity of the racing in the Basque Country, is something very special indeed. Barely a metre of flat, frequently tough weather, a starstudded line-up, and tricky finishes - not to mention the usual large numbers of fans on every one of the hilltops to help keep your adrenalin high - all make getting through the six-day race, let alone winning, an exceptionally dema🌌nding experience.

“There are no easy days here, every day is difficult,” Cummings observed. “You talk about it in the peloton, everybody has sore legs, it’s hard terrain, harꦇd weather, it doesn&rsquoꦬ;t get much harder.”

Still, when it came to seeing where a stage win could best be captured, Cummings had definitel༺y done his homework, and sharing a hotel room with local rider Igor Anton, he said, helped a great deal in the preparation process.

“I ask him all the time, every minute, 'what&r꧑squo;s this road like, what’s that road like?' It’s been very good to have two guys in the team,” - Anton and Omar Fraile - “because it&rsq♔uo;s important to know what’s coming up, they’ve been a great help.”

As for the actual stage win, Cummings said he had had a similar experience to stage 1, where he suffered on the last climb immediately before making a dig in the closing kil🍬ometers before the finish, but then in this case, his final breakaway paid off well.

“It’s the same kind of scenario, I can’t really move on the climb ‘cos I haven’t got the legs so I’m just hanging and from that moment to the final you’re always looking for an opport🦂unity, a slowing or a rise.”

“Sometimes it comes, sometimes it doesn’t, but it’s always worth a lit🙈tle try, otherwise you sit there and get twentieth.”