After Four Days of Racing, La Vuelta a Espana Makes the Transfer from Belgium to Spain

The first four days of the Tour of Spain have been a battle of nerves, constant fighting for position, luck and attrition. Considering the mountainous course the organizers have served up in the final Grand Tour of the year, you wouldn't have known it from the first four days which began in The Netherlands, dipped briefly into Germany and finished in Belgium. With the narrow roads, bricks and cobblestones, innumerable medians, roundabouts and various other road furniture, wind and rain, the collective frayed nerves of the peloton could be seen play out time and again - crashes, both large and small, have been a constant companion along with the race. The worst crash was on day four, and you can view it as Steve and I called it for Universal Sports:

http://www.universalsports.com/mediaPlayer/media.dbml?id=646459&db_oem_id=23000

Unfortunately for American Chris Horner, he ended up breaking his wrist in that crash and has been forced out of competition for the fourth time this season; Tour of CA in March (knee injury), Tour of the Basque Country (broken clavicle), Giro d'Italia (broken leg), and now this. Chris always has such a good attitude through it all, and he's an incredibly talented and respected athlete. He was one of the "protected" riders on Team Astana for the Vuelta, and I was hoping to see him shine come the mountains of Spain. It is truly a shame to see him injured again, and I wish him a fast recovery and a much more fortunate season in 2010.

After that crash, there were only six riders left to contest the finish, and Andre Greipel, the German riding for the U.S. Columbia - HTC team took his 16th win of the season. He's racked up the second largest number of race wins in men's professional cycling this year, behind his teammate Mark Cavendish - who just won six stages of the Tour de France, and has over 20 wins to his credit this season.

Even in the less than appealing weather, huge crowds awaited the riders in The Netherlands and Belgium, surprising even the race organizers and the riders themselves, but most everyone will be glad to leave the treacherous conditions behind as they head into the more familiar terrain of this race - which will be found in Spain. Mountains get slowly introduced over the next several days, but by Sunday there will be no mistake about what lies ahead - the terrain in this Vuelta will be the more difficult than the Tours of Italy or France. The climbs are ridiculously steep, some reaching grades close to 20% in the ensuing days, and that all begins with Sunday's 111 mile affair which has eight different rated climbs - this will be the first day to see who is likely to be amongst the contenders when the race finishes two weeks later, in Madrid. Luckily for the riders, the climbs on day eight are not the steepest, or the longest climbs of the race, but those days will not be far away.

There are three consecutive mountain top finishes on days 12, 13 and 14, and if anyone still has any snap in his legs at that point there will not be many riders left to contend with. With three consecutive days finishing on major climbs, a rider who's got the acceleration and the staying power to back up an attack will be able to gain big time on most all, if not all, of his rivals.

With just under 40 miles of time trials in this year's race, one thing's for certain - the winner will make his mark in the mountains.