Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ.fr) took his second stage win of the 2014 Vuelta a España, outsprinting Michael Matthews (Orica-Greenedge) and Peter Sagan (Cannondale) on a day that the wind played havoc on the plains of Spain.

The French sprinter was barely seen for much of the day, but always made the front group as crosswinds twice split the peloton. Echelons were continuously spread across the road for the final 25km, but all of the GC contenders came home in the same time.

Elia Favili (Lampre-Merida) and Javier Aramendia (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) were the two escapees of the day, building a maximum advantage of just under seven minutes midway through the stage. However the breakaway was unlikely to survive for two days in succession, and the duo were caught with 40km remaining.

The final hour of racing could have been uneventful, but as the crosswinds blew on the long, straight road to the finish in Albacete, Tinkoff-Saxo, Trek, Sky and Belkin combined forces to split the peloton in three with 25km remaining. But with all the overall contenders and sprinters in the front group, the pace slackened allowing the second group to regain contact.

However 10km later and Tinkoff-Saxo and Sky were again on the front, this time forcing a split which caught out Nairo Quintana, Dan Martin, and John Degenkolb. With teammate Valverde in the front group, Quintana was unable to chase, instead relying on Degenkolb’s Giant-Shimano team to drag the second group back into contention.

With two wins already in this year’s Vuelta, the green jersey of Degenkolb was arguably the favourite in the bunch sprint, but was caught out as Bouhanni accelerated early, quickly opening daylight to the German before holding off Michael Matthews to take the win by a bike length.

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