Alberto Contador stamped his authority on the Tirreno-Adriatico with a dominant showing in yesterday's big mountain stage. We have already posted several reactions and have gathered a few more below.

 

Andriy Grivko (Astana, part of the early breakaway, 40th +6.37)

“Today everybody raced like it was the final stage. I went into the breakaway and then on the second-to-last climb waited for Scarponi to help him get further up in the overall classification. It worked, but on the last climb at 30% it was just impossible to race. If you lost balance you could flip over."

 

Roberto Reverberi (sports director Bardiani whose best rider was Stefano Pirazzi in 29th)

”Our strategy today was different, because we planned to send one rider in the break of the day. In fact there were a lot of possibility to stay away to the finish as Geschke, King and Hansen did, finishing behind an unbeatable Contador. On the other side, Pirazzi tried to attack on Passo Lanciano but he was too generous and compromised the chance to achieve a good result. At the end, we could do better today but I’m sure the guys will recuperate tomorrow."

 

Martial Gayant (sports director FDJ whose best rider was Alexandre Geniez in 15th)

"It's really good. Quite simply, he confirms his status, that he is at the level of the best climbers in the world in what is a new context for him. Alex will not be a leader who naturally leads him team, who gives orders easily, but on the bike, he is very convincing. I can say that what he did this weekend is important for the team as we cannot always rely on the same. Our leader had some issues [Thibaut Pinot was forced out of the race with knee paid] but Alexandre is there to take over. This is definitely a good day after the stage win and third place of Arthur Vichot in Paris-Nice. Our list of strong riders have become longer."

 

Jaco Venter (MTN-Qhubeka, 96th +21.27)

“We missed the break today which was disappointing but it also allowed us to save some energy for tomorrow. It is our last real chance to get a big result here at the Tirreno and I’m really hoping we can do something.

 

“Personally I am also looking forward to the final TT. It’s only 9km so I hope I have good legs and I’ll definitely give it my best shot. The level here is very high so I’m not sure what to expect but we will see on Tuesday."

 

Enrico Poitschke (sports director NetApp-Endura whose best rider was Bartosz Huzarski in 19th)

“Seven kilometers before the finish line, David [De La Cruz] unfortunately slowed down from one second to the next. That is naturally unfortunate, since he would have finished fifth if he had had enough energy. You also have to take into consideration that David has had some heath issues in recent weeks and wasn’t back in top form yet. He thus rode a really strong race today, especially after yesterday’s long and difficult stage.

 

“Bartosz and Tiago [Machado] also rode an excellent race today. We had both of them in the pursuit group and Bartosz was able to improve from 27th to 16th in the general classification. When you look at the names of all the famous cyclists behind him, he really did a great job here."

 

You can read our preview of stage 6 here and follow our live coverage at 14.15 CET.