Stage 3 - Nadvirna > Lyucha Third and final day in the Ukraine and it's probably the most crucial stage: a challenging, partly hilly (but flat rated) 44km timetrial, that should see the best TT specialists fighting for the win and/or a notable GC result. Yesterday's hilltop finish brought some big gaps though and so only a few timetrialers remain in contention for the Top-10/5/1 here:
1
Jay McCarthy
Ayubowan!
3h30'51
2
Ion Izagirre
Iberia - Team Degenkolb
+ 1'14
3
Aleksandr Pluchkin
Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff
+ 1'16
4
Alexey Lutsenko
Team Reddit
+ 1'37
5
Stanislau Bazhkou
Xero Racing p/b Octagon
+ 2'39
6
Enrico Barbin
Kulczyk - DMTEX
+ 3'04
7
Mikhail Ignatiev
Fablok - Bank BGZ
+ 3'34
8
Gaëtan Bille
Generali - EDF
+ 3'55
9
Jerome Coppel
Carrefour - ESPN
+ 4'12
10
Kristjan Koren
Generali - EDF
+ 4'13
..
22
Yevgeni Nepomnyachsniy
Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff
+ 5'50
..
28
Dominique Cornu
Euskaltel - Elior
+ 5'56
29
Kai Reus
Swisslion Cycling Team
+ 5'57
..
33
Martijn Keizer
Indosat Ooredoo - ANZ
+ 6'00
Izagirre and Pluchkin as the big favorites to fight for the GC victory, as McCarthy is amongst the worst TT riders of all starters here! Also Bazhkou in a promising position to fight for the podium, just like Ignatiev. Coppel may be already too far behind Pluchkin/Izagirre, but will definitely aim for the stage win and maybe the GC podium with a very special performance. Other riders such as Cornu or Keizer as other stage contenders, who will also hope to make a nice jump in the GC.
For those riders, who are not in GC contention anymore, we have a look at the fastest coming through the third and final split:
Schädlich clearly faster than Golovash (12 seconds), Kovalev (13) and Ford (36)!
Sergent equals the split time then!
Zmorka as one of the big favorites for the stage and he's the fastest at the final split, 16 seconds ahead of Schädlich!
Tennant just 4 seconds slower and still within striking distance for the remaining 16km of the parcours!
Rolland 9 seconds off Zmorka's final split time..
Zmorka delivers the best time of the early non Top-50 starters though!
Tennant + 16" as a strong prosiviosnal 2nd at the finish Rolland + 20" as 3rd so far - he will aim for maybe a Top-30 in the GC eventually..
Keizer (33rd GC + 6.00) may hope for a higher Top-20 in the GC today and of course for a proper stage result after yesterday's tough hilly stage. He's as fast as Zmorka at the final split:
2 seconds faster at the finish: new best time by Keizer!
Kung + 54" for quite a solid time and the U25 classification secured Reus + 1'05" and a rather disappointing result..
Cornu (28th GC + 5.56) with the same goal as Keizer, but he's 12 seconds slower at the final split:
+ 20" as provisional 4th at the finish, behind Keizer, Zmorka and Tennant
Froome (15th GC + 4.40) with a tough day: + 2'53" Villella (14th GC + 4.32) even worse, as expected: + 3'50" Dyrnes (13th GC + 4.25) slightly worse: + 3'59" Bellis (12th GC + 4.17) at a similar level: + 4'00" Quevedo (11th GC + 4.13) slightly faster: + 3'30"
Koren (10th GC + 4.13) with the clear goal to improve in the GC and to land a notable stage result, too. He's going past Quevedo already 14km before the finish, but he's a minute slower than Keizer at the split:
+ 1'39" as provisional 8th at the finish
Coppel (9th GC + 4.12) next and clearly the favorite for the stage, that suits his skillset perfectly. Best split times everywhere:
new best time at the finish, 56 seconds faster than Keizer! Quite a performance and his GC podium ambitions may be still alive!
Bille (8th GC) is here to defend his Top-10 and he's definitely a solid rider for timetrials. He's clearly slower than Coppel, obviously, and crosses the final split with
+ 1'54" on Coppel, who will easily go past him in the GC that way (as to be expected, to be fair)!
Ignatiev (7th GC) with an advantage on Coppel prior to the stage, but the veteran ain't the TT force he used to be in the past:
7th at the final split, 55 seconds slower than Coppel!
Barbin (6th GC) as one of those riders, who just don't know how to handle TT bikes.. his goal is to limit the damage, but let's keep it short for his efforts today: he will finish 151st on the stage, losing more than 5 minutes on Coppel eventually. He will definitely drop off the GC's Top-10 and maybe even further!
Bazhkou (5th GC) rode a great stage yesterday and with a minute advantage on Ignatiev and almost two minutes on Coppel, he may actually hope to holf off those big guns in the GC eventually. He's quite strong at the final split, too:
54 seconds behind Coppel and so slightly better than Ignatiev actually!
Lutsenko (4th) with another minute advantage in the GC, but with Bazhkou, Ignatiev and Coppel clearly the better TT riders, he definitely needs to fight for the GC's Top-5 today:
2'06" lost already at the final split with still 16km to go..
Pluchkin (3rd GC + 1.16) as one of the two big favorites to take the GC win here. Coppel about three minutes down in the GC, so probably too far behind to go past Pluchkin. He's not too fast at the third split however:
1'12" slower than Coppel as 13th at the split!
Izagirre (2nd GC + 1.14) with just a 2-seconds advantage on Pluchkin prior to the stage, but the Spaniard does significally better at the third split:
43 seconds off Coppel's split time and therefore clearly ahead of Pluchkin as 2nd at the split! The party hilly parcours might have suit him better after all..
McCarthy then and being amongst the worst in TTs clearly won't help him today:
3'06" behind Coppel at the third split and still a way to go here:
GC
Split#3
1
McCarthy
3h30'51
+ 3'06
2
Izagirre
+ 1'14
+ 43
3
Pluchkin
+ 1'16
+ 1'12
4
Lutsenko
+ 1'37
+ 2'06
5
Bazhkou
+ 2'39
+ 54
6
Barbin
+ 3'04
+ 3'12
7
Ignatiev
+ 3'34
+ 55
8
Bille
+ 3'55
+ 1'54
9
Coppel
+ 4'12
BT
10
Koren
+ 4'13
-
So let's have a look at the results at the finish for the Top-8 in the GC then:
Bille + 3'03" Ignatiev + 1'26" Barbin + 5'37"
Bazhkou + 1'32" and so holding off Ignatiev in the final GC!
Lutsenko + 3'41" and so falling behind Bazhkou, Ignatiev and also Coppel!
Pluchkin + 1'51" for a rather disappointing result as 17th on the stage
Izagirre + 1'22" as 7th - not too much lost on Coppel as well, the GC win is secured..
..since McCarthy goes + 5'24" at the finish! His great performance yesterday was clearly needed, but he will drop a few places in the GC nevertheless:
GC
Split#3
Finish
1
McCarthy
3h30'51
+ 3'06
+ 5'24
2
Izagirre
+ 1'14
+ 43
+ 1'22
3
Pluchkin
+ 1'16
+ 1'12
+ 1'51
4
Lutsenko
+ 1'37
+ 2'06
+ 3'41
5
Bazhkou
+ 2'39
+ 54
+ 1'32
6
Barbin
+ 3'04
+ 3'12
+ 5'37
7
Ignatiev
+ 3'34
+ 55
+ 1'26
8
Bille
+ 3'55
+ 1'54
+ 3'03
9
Coppel
+ 4'12
BT
BT
10
Koren
+ 4'13
-
+ 1'35
Coppel did, what he came for: two stage-wins! A dominating victory today, beating Keizer by 56 seconds and Zmorka by 58 seconds. Tennant a strong 4th ahead of Cornu, Rolland and a crucial 7th place for Izagirre then.
Ignatiev, Schädlich and Sergen complete the Top-10 ahed of a strong Bazhkou and Koren..
Izagirre is the big winner of the Tour of Ukraine! Thanks to a strong performance in the both key stages, he delivers a fantastic GC victory. His lack of acceleration did not really hurt his performances this time and given his combination of climbing hills and riding timetrials, he's definitely a worthy winner of this year's Tour of Ukraine. Well done.
Pluchkin has to settle for (yet another) 2nd place in a stage race this season! His best runner-up result so far into the season though, since the hilly profile of this race clearly did not suit his skills to perfection. For today's timetrial, he might have hoped for more, however, but Izagirre clearly had the better legs eventually. Still a good result overall.
Bazhkou completes the podium! And what a tight decision between him and:
Coppel as 4th! Seperated by only one second eventually, Bazhkou will be absolutely delighted to play his allround skills in such a perfect manner here. Coppel of course unlucky to miss out on the GC podium by such a small margin, but with two stage wins (and the points jersey), he still goes away with a nice points haul.
Ignatiev 5th and so both Lutsenko (6th) and McCarthy (7th) dropping off the Top-5 then: as to be expected in a way. A solid result for Ignatiev and also McCarthy might be pleased with this 7th place eventually. With a stage-win and the KoM jersey in addition to this GC result, he definitely enjoyed the trip to Ukraine - except of those 44km of timetrialing today.
Koren a somewhat solid 8th for Generali, which also have Bille (10th), Kung (12th) and Dees (14th) in the Top-15 eventually! Rolland adds a solid 19th as well..
Keizer with a huge jump onto 9th in the final GC today! Cornu 11th, Reus 13th, Haga goes up to 15th ahead of Froome and a disappointing Nempomnyachsniy. Barbin dropped from 6th to 21st!
Coppel winning the points classification ahead of Pluchkin and Izagirre/Ignatiev..
McCarthy secures one jersey by winning the KoM classification ahead of Lutsenko!
Kung comfortably wins the U25 classification..
..and Generali - EDF takes the team's classification thanks to a great TT depth today!
