Garmin Trans Portugal
Spills on Day 4
Agnelo Quelhas / 06.05.2010
After the hardships of yesterday’s stage, where each curve hid another big climb and threatened to finish off the last power reserves the racers had, today was supposedly a softer one, where everybody could recover from the very difficult and epic last three days. That is if you can call a 132km trail with 2600 meters of climb, and plenty of very technical zones, soft ... In the end the stage indeed proved not to be so easy, as it created some tricky situations even for the top racers.
Morning dawned very cold and it was with winter like temperatures, close to zero degrees Celsius, that the challenges of the day began. The athletes had to get the warmest clothes from their bags in order to withstand the freezing wind on the long descent out of Penhas da Saúde. Here the track goes from 1400m of altitude to 400m in a few kilometres, with the trail in poor condition that become quite tiresome well before you get to Cova da Beira at the foot of the hills.
After reaching the valley the racers rolled through rural roads to Monsanto. This section includes some difficulties, as it passes through very rocky areas and some steep climbs.
Unfortunately a few miles before CP4D a distraction with the GPS caused the Czech athlete Spolc Milan to have a nasty fall which left him reeling with a bruised right knee and the front wheel of his bike destroyed, preventing him from completing the stage. João Baptista also had a crash that destroyed the front wheel of his bike and left him in poor condition, luckily it was something light enough that could be fixed with a good bath. And the days misfortunes were no over yet, the worst one happened some hours later, with Nuno Luz falling in the descent from Monsanto and actually breaking a wrist. Both Milan Spolc like Nuno Luz are being seen at Castelo Branco’s hotel, waiting to be diagnosed later.
Today's victory once again belonged to Luis Leão Pinto. He crossed the finish line at Idanha Natura Hotel by 15h:08m, 30 minutes ahead of Ricardo Melo, Tiago Silva and Marco Almeida who arrived in a group. The fifth was Greg Anderson, 34 minutes after the winner.
Tomorrow marks the beginning of the southern trails. After crossing Portugal’s biggest river (Tejo), through the bridge at Vila Velha de Rodão, the racers will enter the Alentejo region, which will only be left again in stage 8, when they enter the Algarve region. Tomorrow’s stage will have some hot spots, like the Portas de Ródão natural monument, the thinnest crossing of the Tejo river in Portuguese territory, and the medieval cobblestone road of Castelo de Vide, which enters the old part of the village and leads the athletes to the finish line at the Sol e Serra hotel after 103 kms of riding and 2211 meters of vertical climbs.
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