Luis León Sanchez wins final Castilla y Leon stage

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Luis León Sánchez (Caja Rural) won today the last stage of the Vuelta a Castilla y León by attacking in the descent of the last category 1 climb to Alto de los Portillinos and soloing until the finish line.

Meanwhile, David Belda successfully defended his leadership and along with his teammates of Burgos BH stood tall before Caja Rural, Movistar Team and Efapel-Glassdrive, that tried for most of the stage to knock them out but didn't succeed. The final podium was completed by Marcos García (2nd, Caja Rural) and Sylwester Szmyd (3rd, Movistar Team).

Luis León Sánchez assured this was "an unexpected success," since his form wasn't very good in the eve of the race. "I think I made some mistakes when setting up my calendar for this year. I chose to start racing early, with the Tropicale Amissa Bongo [where Sánchez won a stage and was 2nd overall – ed.] in January, against the criteria of the team, and that has affected my form later. I think I caught some sort of sickness which didn't allow me to suffer on the bike. I will find out more about it tomorrow, after receiving the results of some medical tests I went under this month. Anyway, today I felt good, had a go descending and was strong enough to arrive alone to the finish line."

After yesterday's exhibition in the summit finish to Alto de Lubián, David Belda and his Burgos BH team expected a showdown by Movistar Team and Caja Rural, the two biggest teams on this race, probably unpleased of being defeated by a Continental team.

The route was demanding, 165 kilometers form Lubián to Bembibre meant to become a hell, with five categorized climbs, two of them category 1 – Alto del Peñón (km 56) and Alto de los Portillinos (km 113), being the last climb the Alto de Onamio (cat3) with 18 kilometers to go.

The chances for Burgos BH came from their relatively strong line-up, with climbers like Igor Merino and Jesús del Pino and rouleurs like Juan José Oroz to protect Belda; a 53 seconds gap obtained on the Alto de Lubián; and the light rivalry between Caja Rural and Movistar Team, which don't use to get along, but to compete head to head. In the end, there lied the key of the race.

The race was nervous and full of attacks. Every one of them had several tactics involved. The main one was a 31-man breakaway which formed before Alto del Peñón and faced it with a decent gap. Movistar Team only had two of it weakest riders there and pulled to neutralize the group. But it wasn't the ProTeam, but Portuguese Efapel-Glassdrive the squad that completed the chase shortly before the summit, reducing the bunch to hardly 20 riders in the process.

A section of favorable terrain generated some relax in the race mood, and around 60 riders gathered together in the bunch before the start of the climb to Los Portillinos. Many moves formed and vanished there; some didn't prosper because lack of understanding between the members of the group, some were shut down by Burgos BH.

Neo-pro Beñat Txoperena (Euskadi) was the only one to build a relevant gap on the group of favorites. The Basque rider was the head of the race when Luis León Sánchez launched his attack, and joined him in his way to the finish line until unfortunately crashing into a motorcycle and leaving Sánchez alone to comfortably celebrate his victory. Sergio Sousa was second, rewarding Efapel's performance; José Joaquín Rojas was third, awarding Movistar Team a scarce prize while Burgos BH obtained the bigger one.

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