Tim Wellens (Lotto-Soudal) has made a solid start towards winning a second Vuelta a Andalucia after the Belgian repeated his 2018 victory on the difficult hilltop finish of Alcala de los Gazules. Wellens launched a powerful counterattack with 120 metres to go, just as a late acceleration by recent Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana winner Ion Izagirre (Astana) petered out on the ever-changing cobbled gradients of the finishing ascent. Thanks to his powerful late acceleration, Wellens crossed the line with a useful five seconds advantage on Astana duo Jakob Fuglsang and Izagirre, whilst Mitchelton-Scott’s Jack Haig came home in fourth in the same time. The remainder of the peloton was shattered by a ferociously fast finale and the tough, kilometre-long, uphill finish in the town in western Andalucia, meaning Wellens has claimed an solid early lead overall.ADVERTISEMENT “Of course I knew the final from last year and I was in a good position at its foot, but the team did very well, too, in the last kilometres” Wellens said after claiming the 25th win of his career. “I started following wheels at the foot of the climb, but then went for it with 200 metres to go and nobody could come after me.” The winner of the 2018 Vuelta a Andalucia as well as on the stage to Alcala de los Gazules last year, Wellens has already tasted victory this season, at the Trofeo Serra de Tramuntana, part of the Challenge Mallorca series. However, he went down with a viral infection afterwards, could not train for a week, and said in a team press release on Tuesday that Andalucia’s GC may not be such a big goal in 2019 as it was in 2018. How it unfolded
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