The riders line up today for just under 160km around Lincoln, a tough hill and a section of cobbles as we can see an open battle between pure cobblists like Bakari, Thomas, Bush and Drucker and the cobblists who can climb like De Maar, Grashev, Marcos, De Vreese, De Haes and Pozzato. Let’s get to the racing!
By the time we come around to the cobbled section the first time we already have a 5 man move with a 50 second lead on the pack containing:
Ikibe Bayly Rijntjes Nakane Van Leijen
With the latter being clearly the best cobblist in the group. Behind in the pack Ferrero, Chiquita and Carlsberg show confidence in their leaders by controlling the pack.
The great Bakari shows himself on the front, while Van Leijen surprisingly drops back to the peloton.
With 21km and just two ascents of the hill left we see a surprising move, Lee and Rathe pull a group of 9 off the front over the top of the hill and we find a move containing 9 riders
De Maar, Lee, Boonen Marcos, Rathe, Mathews Pozzato. Würtz Grashev
Behind them 8 riders chase and will surely come back if the pace lets up for a second, the disadvantage for them is not many have reason to help set the pace with two Carlsberg riders slowing stuff down.
Bush, Naesen, Peters Mygind, Østergaard De Vreese Thomas Drucker
They only have a very lean gap to another chasing group containing the remaining favourites and let’s not forget that the four breakaway riders are still 1 minute up the road!
Naesen finds himself off the front of the chasee and both Drucker and De Vreese realise this could be now or never, following the Belgian across to the leading group. The resulting slowdown in the chase sees the pack catch up to form a 27 man group 40 seconds down the road!
Ikibe escapes his breakaway companions and opens up a large lead as he heads for the penultimate ascent of the climb.
With 13km left, Bayly, Rijntjes and Nakane are caught by this group, which has extended its lead on the pack to 2 minutes! Ikibe however is still up the road with 40 seconds lead.
Grashev places a move up the climb and the reaction behind is delayed! The late joiners of this group Drucker, De Vreese and Naesen accompanied by De Maar escape to chase him, while Pozzato, Bayly and Marcos all escape the group to chase individually as well!
De Maar escapes the group to pursue the leaders. Ahead, Grashev joins Ikibe, with the dup holding a 20 second lead. Behind Pozzato and Marcos join the chase while Bayly begins to collapse and Boonen begins to chase this group.
A hefty effort from Pozzato pulls the leading 8 back together as they look to have distanced chasers like Boonen. So nobody will have any teammates here for the final 6 kilometres!
There’s a slow pace until the final kilometre, where Pozzato ups the pace with Marcos, De Maar and Grashev behind, pulling open a small gap to the others.
Pozzato puts in an initial acceleration that others can’t match but De Maar and Marcos fight to come back to him as the finish line nears!
Pozzato can’t be matched and takes a great win! Unfortunately the combination of a steep hill and cobblestones ruins his chance to celebrate it. De Maar has to settle for second place same as last year, while Marcos takes the final podium spot. Grashev follows on his wheel for 4th and Naesen takes 5th before De Vreese and Ikibe who must be very happy with a top 10. The last rider of this group, Drucker finds the hill was too much for him and has to settle for 8th.
Boonen was too good to get caught but not good enough to catch the front and takes 9th in no-man’s land.
The battle for the final spot in the top 10 ends in heartbreak for Bayly who is caught by the favourites group, where Matthews beats Bush to the final top 10 position.
Pozzato can stand on the podium the winner of the 2016 Lincoln GP!
