"In the end I made a mistake in the corner, but it is what it is" - Mixed feelings for João Almeida at the end of a brutal day in Itzulia

The third day of the Itzulia Basque Country, the first on the hilly terrain of the race, proved to be an absolute roller-coaster and not just in terms of profile. João Almeida, second in the overall classification at the start, spent time on the attack, then catching up with an extremely dangerous move, and then again attacking towards the finale. In the end not much gain, but UAE Team Emirates - XRG showed full support for the Portuguese.

"It was a crazy day, I was feeling good," Almeida said in a post-race interview with CyclingPro.net. The Portuguese and Brandon McNulty moved up the peloton on one of the descents inside the final two hours of racing and together with Movistar attempted to blow up the race. Effectively, the peloton was split to bits, but the attack was brough back.

Then, Marc Soler went on the attack, and UAE put pressure on rival teams. In the penultimate climb of the day however he was dropped from the front of the race and later on by the peloton, where new attacks emerged including a big move that featured Florian Lipowitz and Max Schachmann amongst others. Almeida had teammates with him, but a gap of 30 seconds opened up very quickly, and was only closed at the bottom of the final climb.

"We wanted to do a hard day, all the team was really good, specially in the final to close the gap to the leader's group. We did a good job and can be proud of ourselves," he assures.

On the ascent itself he showed great legs for what is an otherwise not explosive rider, and then even attacked in the final small hilltop. He had a chance of fighting for the stage win, but when riding alongside Alex Aranburu in the final two kilometers he lost this chance: "I did a little mistake in a corner, but it is what it is".