David de la Cruz wins 9th stage to take Spanish Vuelta lead

Movistar’s Nairo Quintana landed a blow on Chris Froome and took possession of the red jersey following stage eight of the Vuelta a Espana.

It allowed De La Cruz to take the red jersey, with the Spaniard, the first home rider to win a stage in this year’s race, lying 22 seconds ahead of Quintana in the standings.

Eventually they were reeled in by the breakaway, but Devenyns, De La Cruz and France’s Alexandre Geniez upped the pace again and moved away.

Froome remains third overall but is now 27 seconds back on Quintana with Valverde second, just 19 seconds adrift of his Movistar teammate.

But when De la Cruz kicked for the line in the final kilometer, Devenyns couldn’t live with him.

“I wasn’t thinking about the (overall) lead at the end”.

“It was very hard to ride with Devenyns because he was hard to beat, but I am the leader as well, I can’t believe it”.

It would be De La Cruz who was able to celebrate the stage win, after breaking his rivals in the closing kilometres to finish solo in a time of 3hr, 47min and 56sec. Its special-category finish at the Lagos de Covadonga is considered one of the classic, and most demanding, ascents of the three-week race.

The three-time Vuelta victor made the decision on Saturday morning to keep racing, something that was in doubt after he took a hard knock and scrapes at the end of the seventh stage.

The first categorised climb of the day comes 50km into the stage (Puerto de San Isidro) and runs for about 11 kilometres, including a short descent, averaging out at 3 per cent.

“I did lose a little bit of time but I’m still in there”.

“I passed the day without problems, let’s see if tomorrow I keep improving”.

“I am satisfied because the goal was simply to stay alive”, Contador said.

“Everyone was cautious at the start of the climb, but then Froome went for it, as we expected, and I responded”, Quintana said.