The sun is out at the start line of the Lincoln GP but there are some clouds in the sky, bringing with them a chance of rain later in the race. The riders are ready to get going as they make their way through the neutral zone. Everyone is expecting a hard day's racing.
Favourites
FLA
HIL
RES
COB
ACC
Kasperkiewicz
74
73
75
79
66
Van Keirsbulck
72
71
73
78
68
Richardson
71
67
68
78
61
Maes
79
66
73
78
66
Taubel
73
65
73
78
64
Orue
69
64
70
78
58
Corwin
69
66
64
77
56
Jacobs
72
63
70
77
62
Kluge
77
67
73
76
73
Nepomnyachsniy
74
64
66
76
76
Lagab
72
70
65
75
72
Young
74
69
70
75
77
Kumara
74
67
70
75
67
Minoungou
70
65
70
75
68
Abraha
72
64
71
75
72
Kolev
74
62
70
75
67
Ruiz
71
60
72
75
58
The pack holds together till the first cobbled sector, but the attacks start as we get on it. The dust settles afterwards to reveal three groups of breakaway riders:
The second and third breakaway groups would merge before the next cobbled hill sector.
And after that sector, only seven riders would remain in the second group, behind the leading group of four.
The third sector has further reduced the second group to just two riders - Narvaez and Welten, chasing the lead group of four.
The six riders joined forces on the fourth circuit.
Five more riders get away from the pack, in two separate attacks. Coronel, Abraha and Batmunkh are being chased by Kolev and Martins Sandoval.
The five attackers would join forces soon after.
The attacks continue as Ruiz, with teammates De Tier and Dahlberg get away, accompanied by Van Wyk and Pozdnyakov.
80 km to go. There's another shakeup at the front on the sixth go-around of the circuit! Ten riders remain in the lead group and the rest have been dropped:
All the dropped riders, six of them, would get back to the front group on the next circuit.
Once again, after the cobbles on the seventh circuit, eleven riders would remain in the lead group. Three riders are already caught by the peloton.
50 km to go. The lead group has further reduced to six riders after completing another circuit - Ruiz, Coronel, Kolev, Abraha, Pozdnyakov, Martins Sandoval.
The chase group consists of Van Wyk, Brkic and Reddish. The others are caught by the peloton, who are just over 2 minutes behind, and down to 52 riders.
Van Wyk catches the lead group on the tenth circuit. Two and a half circuits left in the race.
Nielsen leads Kasperkiewicz away from the peloton with 20 km left. The gap to the break has been steadily increasing over the last 30 km. It is now close to 5 minutes!
The Netia duo wouldn't get far and were caught a couple of kilometers later.
Martins Sandoval with an attack just before the final cobbled sector. 13 km to go.
The Azteca rider would not be allowed to build a gap.
Kolev and Van Wyk have been dropped on the final sector.
Kasperkiewicz attacks again. Maes chases. The pack is still nearly four minutes behind.
4 km remaining. The leading group of five are still together, and they have a lapped rider for company.
Behind, Kasperkiewicz and Maes still have a gap to the chasing group.
Eleven riders remain in the chase group, with the final cobbles section doing some serious damage to the pack.
Jacobs chasing with help from Bille in the next group.
Orue, Richardson, Lagab, Corwin, Van Keirsbulck and Kumara are further behind.
The five riders at front are still together with 1.5 km left. No attacks as they approach the cobbled hill to the finish.
Ruiz is the first to attack. Mudgway is inadvertently in the mix. Hope he moves over soon.
300 meters left now. Ruiz has has been caught and passed. The former doesn't have another acceleration in him. At the front. from left to right, it's Coronel, Martins Sandoval and Abraha. Pozdnyakov is in the middle behind the front three. Ruiz is further behind.
Behind them, Kasperkiewicz and Maes have been caught by what's left of the peloton.
100 meters. The white jerseys in the middle is where the action is at. Cornel is just ahead of Abraha at the front.
Abraha closes in further as we reach the final 50 meters.
Abraha runs out of road as Coronel takes yet another cobbles victory for NENT! Abraha is 2nd.
Martins Sandoval continues Azteca's good season with 3rd. A very good race for Pozdnyakov and CYBEX, with a 2-4 result.
Ruiz finishes 5th.
Kolev is 6th, followed by Van Wyk.
Kluge takes 8th place from the reduced bunch. Kasperkiewicz is 9th.
Young completes the Top 10.
Today's winner - Samuel Coronel.
A very unconventional race, where there was never any stability right form the start. The peloton ran out of chasing legs as riders kept getting dropped every time they tackled the cobbled hill on the circuit. NENT is celebrating another top result, with just the winner changing in a cobbled race. CYBEX arguably with the best team performance, having three riders finishing in the Top 7. A lot of the stronger cobbles riders had a hard race, finishing somewhere in the 10th to 30th range.
