Dan Martin and soigneur Sophie Roullouis, Castilla y Leon stage 4Once again, we woke up to strong winds and cold. Actually as half the team heads off to Belgium next week, it is good training. Call me soft, but I would prefer a bit of sunshine. (Dan pictured above with French soigneur Soso Roullois.)

Anyway, to the race. We did try and put a few Spanish guys in the hurt-box, but it wasn’t enough to make an impact on the race. So basically the whole day boiled down to a big fight for position before the last climb. The pace was fast at the bottom, and to be honest, this hurt me a lot. I gave it my all before getting dropped by the leaders at about 4.5 km to go.

The last 2 km was so steep, it felt almost airless. Maybe the altitude mixed with the cold.

Christian rode really well, and hung on to a top ten spot overall. Tomorrow will be interesting as it’s the hardest stage with heaps of climbing. Hopefully we can go out in style by causing a bit of chaos.