It was one of those Vuelta flat stages that took in four categorised climbs and finished on the uphill. I suspect the organisers were using the term ‘flat’ in the loosest possible way. The climbs might have been a Cat 2 and three Cat 3s but it did the damage. Alejandro Valverde outsprinted Michal Kwiatkowski and Laurens De Plus for the stage win, but the Sky rider took the red from Rohan Dennis, who came in more than 13min down and tumbles to 139th.
