MADRID: Dutchman Danny van Poppel won the 12th stage of the Tour of Spain on Thursday despite suffering a puncture about 10-km from the finish line. The Trek Factory Racing rider was dropped by a speeding peloton but fought his way back and eventually prevailed against South African Daryl Impey (Origa GreenEDGE).

Tosh van der Sande (Lotto-Soudal) came home third in the 173-km leg from Andorra to Lleida. Fabio Aru of Italy retained the overall leader’s red jersey for the Astana team. He heads Spain’s Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) and Dutchman Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) by 27 and 30sec respectively.