So on to the first road stage of the race. There are some small climbs out on course but nothing too challenging. The main climb of the day, which is category 4, is about 2km long and averages a fairly steady 6%, without any major spikes in gradient. The 52km course is ridden 3 times, with this climb taken in each time and another short uncategorised rise. The categorised climb is worth 5 points for the winner, and with Taaramae taking 16 for his win yesterday we can guarantee that he will be keeping his mountain jersey at the end of the day.
Our first attacker is Patrick Schelling, the young Swiss rider on loan from ProTour team UBS.
He is followed by several other riders: Magnus Cort Nielsen Eric Young Joseph Dombrowski Hugo Houle Honorio Machado
Perhaps it is because of the reputation of Dombrowski or the fact that Machado won multiple Giro stages last year, but clearly the peloton is not happy with this group and so Andre Vital chases it down.
Chad Beyer is the next rider to give it a shot.
He gets a bit of a gap and quickly Omar Fraile bridges up to him. These two work well and start ot pull out some sort of a gap.
Seeing the success that these two riders are having some others try to give it a go. They are: Jonathon Tiernan-Locke Patrick Schelling Matic Strgar Magnus Cort Nielsen Bram Tankink
They are only away for half a moment however before Bruno Silva receives the order to catch them and catch them he does.
The next attack comes from some different riders: Mateusz Taciak Moris Possoni Juliano Polito Hugo Houle
This time the chase and catch come from Eduard Beltran. Clearly the teams only want a small break today. Nevetheless several more riders are going to give this a go: Tomohiro Kinoshita Will Routley Sonomtseren Delgerbayar Joseph Dombrowski
Once again the catch comes from Bruno Silva, who also reels in the two earlier attackers, meaning that everyone is together for the moment. Of course that won’t last long as riders give it a go. These names have all tried already: Patrick Schelling Sonomtseren Delgerbayar Joseph Dombrowski Eric Young Will Routley Honorio Machado
Tyhe win is really gusting out on course and with constant changes in direction it is becoming hard for the peloton. Prio-Porto set a cracking pace in pursuit of these most recent attackers and just as they catch the attackers the cameras switch to the back of the peloton. 21 riders have been dropped on the flat!
No leaders are back here but several domestiques who were probably hoping for a decent GC position are here: Jimmi Briceno Gabriele Bosisio Sebastian Salas Jaroslaw Dabrowski
The attackers are caught and some of the teams with sprinters take up the pace, realising that they might have a shot at contesting the first sprint. Hollister, Prio-Porto and VolksWagen are all present on the front, looking to set this up.
And the peloton does reach the first sprint without any further attackers. Strangely only two riders go for it, with Oscar Avelino taking the 6 points and Jaime Castaneda taking the 4. Rolling over in third is Wilson Marentes. If Avelino or Castaneda win the stage today and Taaramae doesn’t score points they can take the points jersey now.
The gap back to the dropped riders is now up to 4 minutes but the peloton has now sat up, meaning that the gap could close easily. What it is also means is that there is a chance for an attack to go and we get someone willing to give it a go as Mateusz Taciak puts in a dig.
Two riders bridge up to him: Bram Tankink Will Routley
The peloton is content with just the three of them and they sit up. No other attackers want to come up and so we have our break of the day.
It is interesting to note that, unlike the usual case, this is a break of three very experienced riders. In fact Tankink at 35 could well be in his last every professional season, so he is probably enjoying a chance to relive his younger days.
As said at the beginning, Taaramae is not going to lose his mountain jersey today and it perhaps because of that that we see the break not fighting for the first mountain points. Routley rolls over in first place, with Tankink second and Taciak third.
At this point the dropped group of riders get back into the peloton. The long chase will have hurt some legs but they might avoid losing time today at least.
We get to the second sprint point and here the competition is much fiercer. Routley crosses the line first with Tankink and Taciak swapping positions this time.
The gap is out to 5’08” with 76km remaining in the course, which is still a decent lead. In fact the gap hasn’t changed at all when we hit the second climb of the day – with 57km to go the break is suddenly looking dangerous. Not only that but this time the riders look to actually fight for the mountain points. Routley is clearly greedy today as he takes the mountain points and once again Tankink is second and Taciak is third.
Hollister, Prio-Porto and VolksWagen are really working, with quite a number of riders each up the front. The wind is still pummelling the race and what is worse is that we now know that the final run-in to the finish will have a headwind too, making it hard to set up trains and execute lead-outs.
The final sprint comes with 22km remaining and the gap is still at 2 minutes. The break are dealing with this wind remarkably well. Routley is on a mission to deny a win to everyone else as he takes the sprint points. Taciak is second and Tankink is third.
Realising that there is now a real danger from the break Bouygues send their riders to the front and with 17km to go, just 5km after the last time check, the gap is down to 40”. That’s a phenomenal effort.
Now the break start to play games amongst themselves. Routley is clearly the strongest today and he puts in an effort. He can’t get away, however, as Tankink sticks to his wheel and Taciak comes back up to them. Tankink then puts in a dig himself but can’t get away.
As we hit the final climb up to the mountain points Routley decides to give it one last-ditch effort as the gap is now down to 20”.
The other two aren’t interested anymore, and just drift back into the bunch. So Routley is all alone climbing up this final hill and remarkably, his gap starts to pull out one or two seconds at a time. The bunch clearly either don’t want to take it up, or they are concerned about dropping their sprinters. Routley reaches the top of the final hill with a 30” lead over the bunch lead by Afonso and Vital.
With 6km left, most of it downhill, the gap stands at 10”, but of course it is not to be as there is still a stage win up for grabs. He is caught by the Hollister train, which appears to be the only one capable of setting up in these winds. With 4.2km to the line the situation is this: Robert Kiserlovski Zakkari Dempster Hector Aguilar Aleksandr Serebriakov Jens Keukeleire
Kiserlovski comes off soon after this, clearly not wanting to burn too much energy. With 3km to go the situation hasn’t changed dramatically with Martijn Keizer now leading out Rick Zabel on the right of the road, but no other teams are organised in the slightest. The downhill might be making it hard, and combining that with the headwind makes it doubly so. Alternatively, the hill might have made it too hard for some sprinters to position themselves.
Dempster pulls off the front.
Aguilar can barely hold his speed and with over 2km still remaining Serebriakov comes straight past, but he has a long way to go! Keizer is pulling tremendously well.
But on the other side of the road there is a resurgence! Santos, Avelino and Kiserlovski are all going strong! How is Kiserlovski doing this?!
And Santos is really flying, and he goes straight into the lead! Zabel clearly is lacking some top-end speed.
And with 1km to go the front is completely reshuffled. Santos is still in the front but behind him all sorts of new names are coming up fast, showing that hiding from the wind was the way to go today. Taaramae, Keukeleire, Fabbri, Zakarin and Sano are all sprinting well. Interesting to see some climbers here, who have clearly benefitted from being placed ideally in the peloton.
Zakarin is sprinting magnificently on the right but coming fastest of all is Kritskiy on the left.
And with 500 left he comes up to Santos’ wheel. Does he have enough to come past?
And he certainly does! Timofey Kritskiy takes the stage win and, more importantly, 20 bonus seconds! That is enough to put him in the leader’s jersey tonight!
Santos holds on for second, with Zakarin taking third for his team to make their day even better. Sano provides another surprise with 4th. Serebriakov will be incredibly disappointed with 5th while Fabbri’s 6th place is a great result for him. Avelino could only manage 7th, with the wind and hill clearly hurting too much. Keukeleire, Pozzovivo and Mezgec round out the top 10.
So that was a weird set of results that will have a dramatic effect on the race. Kritskiy moves into the lead and he now also leads the points competition.
We had one withdrawal today, from someone dropped very early in the race from the wind. That person is Yoshimitsu Hitatsuka.
