Yukiya Arashiro: “I’m happy that I tried”

“Our advantage was reduced to not much at the end but I still tried to go for the stage win. Our fight in the last King of the Mountains made us lose a lot of time but I'm happy to have the red bib [of most aggressive rider] tomorrow in a region that I know well because I've lived in Toulouse for a year [in 2005]. This morning, my idea was to follow a small group if there were breakaway attempts. Eventually I took the initiative because it was pretty quiet. Jan Barta came along but I expected more riders to do so. It was hard in these conditions but I'm happy that I tried. Because of my crash in Qatar [broken femur in February], I haven't raced much with the Lampre-Merida jersey yet. Now I've fully recovered and I feel that I'm in a great shape.”