Haute Route Dolomites stage 3

Stage 3, certainly more suiting of my strengths. The stage in short started at the foot of a 1200m climb, then a short, fast descent. Then another 1200m climb, again a short descent followed almost immediately by the summit finish climb of Gavia. The climb of Gavia they call "one of the most wild" in the Dolomites, I can see why. The start is on your normal 2 lane road, and before you know it you are onto a tight narrow strip of tarmac. Towards the top it becomes very broken up and the grade is adjusting all the time, pitches of 12-16% was seen on my Garmin! All very welcome reminders that my legs have the previous two climbs in them!

The front group seemingly stayed together up the first climb, descended reasonably steady (but at my safe limit). Then we cruised along a 40k valley before the second climb started. I believe the two eventualy first and second placed guys jumped off on this climb, while the main group set up a nice steady rhythm. I lost around 30-60 seconds on the group down that descent. Luckily we started the final climb straight away after the descent so the fun could begin. I was mindful that it was a long day and with many many more days left I kept a close eye on my power so not to go too much into the red. Slowly but surely I picked off many of the people who had been in the group all day. Similarly to stage 1, I had no idea at the finish where I had come but thought I had potentially did alright and certainly got some lost time back from yesterday on some riders.

After speaking to our Sports Tours reps they informed me I was third so the same result as the first stage, happy with that! The results website seems to be having a bit of an episode at the moment so I cannot be 100% of the time gaps etc....

Tomorrow we have the Time Trial up the Stelvio Pass... this should be a good day out.... Some of the riders take the time trials as days off but I feel I have to give it a good go...! Really its only 21k... how hard can it be?! ;-)

The scenery again today has been truly stunning, hopefully I can get some pictures as proof of this tomorrow.