Heroic Samu hangs on

Samu put on a courageous ride yesterday to hang on to his third place overall and even extend it. Samu took a bad tumble early on, laying still on the ground with chest and shoulder pain, but with a little help from his friends got back up eventually and regained contact with the pack. It really didn't look good. He had troubles breathing and I was sure he would be forced to abandon. He was clearly suffering from pain in his right shoulder all the way 'til the top of the Tourmalet but still managed to gap Menchov by eight seconds. Amazing ride. Rubén also did well by, first of all, getting into the break of the day before helping Samu out when he was reeled in on the last climb. The rest of the guys were naturally tired after pacing Samu back up to the pack early on, but Gorka still managed to stay with the group of favourites quite a way up the Tourmalet and grabbing a fine 24th place on the day, 5:15 down. Rubén finished 35th at 6:52, Iván 53rd at 10:51, Egoi 58th at 11:35, Alán was 82nd at 21:14 and Iñaki finished 160th at 31:17. Great team performance. Speaking of the fall post-stage, Samu said: "I'm not exactly sure what happened, but I got hit in the chest and on the right collarbone. I couldn't breath and I couldn't get up straight away. I want to publically say a big thank you to Alberto Contador for deciding to stop the peloton and wait for me. I would have done the same for him; he's a gentleman."