Kelderman slips down Vuelta a Espana standings after puncture - News shorts

Wilco Kelderman slid down the Vuelta a Espana's overall standings after an unfortunate late puncture on stage 7 to Cuenca. The Sunweb rider lost 17 seconds to the group of overall leader Chris Froome (Team Sky) and dropped from 11th to 14th overall.

Kelderman's woes hit with 20km to go when he suffered the puncture. He received a quick wheel change and was being paced back into the peloton by his teammates when a crash happened in front of him, opening a gap that his group never closed.

"On the worst possible moment today I had a flat tyre, just before the final climb," Kelderman said. "Immediately after there was a crash and the bunch split. With the team we tried everything to come back and in the end we closed the gap down to 17 seconds on the group of favourites. It was a tough day but we will continue to try in the coming stages."

ADVERTISEMENT

Kelderman dropped to two seconds behind teammate Warren Barguil in the overall, now at 1:45 in the standings behind Froome.

Jesper Hansen suffers on in Vuelta after double crashes

Astana's Jesper Hansen battled on in the Vuelta a Espana after a serious crash on stage 6, suffering through the race's longest stage to finish in the gruppetto.

"Yesterday, a few hundreds meters after the end of the last climb we faced some narrows roads, and the guy who was in front of me lost the control of his bike," Hansen recalled. "He fell down and I couldn't avoid him because of the speed. I literally flew out from the road and shock, besides the pain, was really big.

Bystrøm out of Vuelta with fractured scapula

— Team KATUSHA ALPECIN (@katushacycling) August 25, 2017

Movistar's Vuelta woes continue as Rojas misses out in Cuenca

You can read more at Cyclingnews.com