Second stage offers the chance for more punchy sprinters to make it much harder for pure sprinters to win this with 3 hilly laps near the end. It will be interesting whether any GC contenders try to attack in last km’s, with the hills providing perfect chance.
First attackers today are straight away let to form the break of the day. The break includes Anton Vorobev, Rohan Dennis, Andris Vosekalns, Jonas Decouttere & Ian Stannard.
After 25km of racing, the gap between the break and the peleton is about a minute. We are just 1km away from the first king of mountain point of the race and Jonas Decouttere initiates the attack!
But it’s the Endura rider, Andris Vosekalns who was at Jonas back till the final metres wins the point and takes 5 points with him. Decouttere finishes on 2nd with 3 points and Ian Stannard on 3rd with 1 points to his name
Andris Vosekalns takes the next intermediate point ahead of Rohan Dennis and Ian Stannard.
On the 2nd category climb we see the closest fight over any point yet in the stage, but it’s however Andris Vosekalns again that takes the win and with it the king of mountain jersey amassing 15 points in total today. Anton Vorobev comes 2nd and Jonas Decouttere rounds of the podium here.
The pace in the peleton is shared by 4 teams today. Hollister Procycling is the main team working for today’s favoruite, Allan Davis. Metinvest-Emirates is helping out for Nolan Hoffman, with local Sram – Riboxx doing the turns hoping for good result from Mezgec. And as always, the leader’s team is alwas up front, defending their lead. The gap with 50km to go stands at 3’02 minutes.
Last intermediate sprint of the day is won by… no surprise Andris Vosekalns. He won all the intermediate points ( 12 ) available on today’s stage and will definitely be happy with the outcome. Rohan Dennis comes 2nd again in the sprint and ends the day on 8 points and Jonas Decouttere gets the last points available.
As we hit last 16km and the beginning of the three hilly laps the gap is now at 51 seconds. The break seems to be doomed. At the front it’s all the same 4 teams sharing the pace.
No attacks occur on the first ascent and when we finish 2nd climb at 9km to the finish, Carlos Betancourt high pace helps the peleton to finally catch the break.
5km to go and there’s no attacks on the last ascent. And that means bunch sprint! No sprint trains are created so far, but Nolan Hoffman sits most comfortable at the front, followed by Luka Mezgec. Allan Davis, Thomas Vaitkus Jerome Giaux and the leader along Simon Geschke are in contention as well.
2.2 km to go and two trains are set up, as follows: (Jiri Hudecek, Gatis Smukulis, Luka Mezgec) (Peter Kusztor, Vitaliy Popkov, Nolan Hoffman)
Simon Geschke, Jerome Giaux & Thomas Vaitkus are following Sram’s train.
While Allan Davis, Mirko Lorenzetto & Tosh Van der Sande are on Hoffman’s back!
Smukulis opens it up with strong acceleration with 1.2km to go! On the other side Popkov is trying to match the Latvian’s acceleration. Meanwhile everyone is still waiting for first sprinters to go and unleash mayhem!
500 metres to go and Smukulis is still in front, Luka Mezgec can’t match his speed and falls down the order! Simon Geschke comes around Mezgec and is looking unstoppable! Can he make it 2/2 for Rothaus ? Nolan Hoffman can’t match the German acceleration, with Allan Davis coming behind his back looking the only one left to challenge the German.
No-one can stop him and Simon Geschke takes another win for Rothaus! Allan Davis comes 2nd, if he was positioned better he would have possibly won the stage. Nolan Hoffman finishes on 3rd. Mirko Lorenzetto takes 4th for Team UPC and quite surprisingly after great leadout, Smukulis holds it’s own to finish 5th. The leader, Martin Velits finishes 6th, but there will be change in guard for tomorrow, with bonus seconds today Geschke takes over the lead from his teammate.
Simon Geschke
Allan Davis
Nolan Hoffman
Mirko Lorenzetto
Gatis Smukulis
Martin Velits
Tomas Vaitkus
Tosh Van der Sande
Vitaliy Popkov
Vasili Kiryenka
Lars Boom
Xavier Zabalo
Ian Stannard
