A very interesting stage today. Four times the same lap of around 39 km, with 2 mountains of first category each lap. A lot of KoM-points to grab today, so Vichot hasn’t won it yet. One of the favourites for today’s stage if the breakaway doesn’t win it is Gesink, who can take a first big step to winning this year’s Tour of Pologne.
18 riders quickly get a 2’ gap over the peloton. In the breakaway we find Antonijevic, Conci, Rubio, Gallopin, Squire (6th KoM), Vichot (1st KoM), De Luna, Pedrero, Raileanu, Potocki, Le Court (4th KoM), Kurianov, Landa, Petilli, Duarte, Urcelay, Neuman and Kebede, who’s 27th in the GC at 2’46”.
The top-3 on the first climb of the day is Squire, Pedrero and Le Court. The American now has 48 points, while Le Court has 70, is now 2nd in the KoM and only has 12 points less than Vichot, who didn’t manage to score here. The peloton is at 2’15”, Carrefour and Xero setting the pace.
The climbs seem to be a bit too hard for the Frenchman, who grabs no points on the second climb as well and is at the back of the group. Conci takes the maximum of the points here, which brings his total onto 30 and he’s now 6th in the KoM-classification. Le Court brings his total to 76, Squire has 60. Vichot still leading by six points, but still six climbs of first category to go. The peloton at 4’15” with 125 km to go.
On the third climb of the day Pedrero manages to hold off Conci, Raileanu and Squire. The points in the KoM top-3 are now like this: Vichot 82, Le Court 78, Squire 68. Pedrero and Conci coming closer and not giving up yet. The peloton at 2’40” with still over 100 km to go. Neuman is the first of the breakaway group to get reeled back in by the peloton, the other 17 start their fourth climb of the day together.
Le Court can’t follow the best uphill anymore, so it seems like she’s also out of the fight for the KoM-jersey, unless she finds her second breath! Pedrero wins it again ahead of Raileanu and Squire. The American and Le Court now have 78 KoM-points, with Vichot still in the lead with 82. Conci has 58, Pedrero 52 and Raileanu 42. A decimated peloton following at 2’ with 88 km and four categorized climbs to go!
83 km to go and only ten riders are left ahead of the peloton. The first group of eight riders consists out of Squire, Conci, Gallopin, Kebede, Raileanu, Pedrero, De Luna and Potocki. Between them and the peloton Urcelay and Kurianov are trying to come back to the front of the race. At the same time Kanerva is being dropped in the peloton, which is a surprise.
The pace at the front is too high for De Luna, who gets blown back to the peloton with 69 km to go. Urcelay and Kurianov have also been caught back, which leaves us with seven leaders. Dowsett and Jung have been dropped in the peloton, which has around 100 riders left.
Well, this is a surprise! With Le Court and Vichot gone, Squire seemed to be the favourite for the KoM. His efforts of yesterday seem to be killing him now, as he has to let the other six leaders go on the fifth climb of the day! Will Conci, Pedrero, or Raileanu take the jersey at the end of the day, or will Vichot somehow still manage to win it if the peloton comes back in time?!
Whoever it will be, it is going to be very close! Conci and Pedrero seem to be losing their energy, as only Raileanu manages to grab a lot of points of the fifth climb of the day! Gallopin and Kebede are second and third but shouldn’t be contending for the KoM-win anymore, or should they? Peloton at 3’ with 60 km to go! Ulissi and Fernandez also dropped in the peloton now.
Bad luck for Lemus Davila. He has a puncture and gets blown back to a chasing group. At the same time, Pedrero seems to be unable to follow the other five leaders on the sixth climb of the day!
Moments later Faiers (21st GC) has the same problem! He has to let the peloton go because of a flat tire, this really is a bad piece of road here in Poland.
50 km to go and the leaders reach the top of the sixth out of eight categorized climbs. Raileanu, Kebede and Potocki are leaving Gallopin and Conci behind! Robov attacks in the peloton to grab some minor points. The peloton itself follows at 2’30”, with Gebrezgabihier (17th GC) now surprisingly in difficulties!
Great work by green jersey Kump! He was dropped on the climb but then saw teammate Faiers and brought him back to the peloton before the penultimate categorized climb! Gebrezgabihier used the opportunity to come back as well, and so did some other interesting names such as Lehtinen (25th GC) and Hiratsuka.
Conci gets caught by the peloton while entering the final 39 km lap of the day, leaving only four leaders who are 1’15” ahead of the peloton. Gebrezgabihier and Lehtinen already being dropped again!
Nobody really taking the lead in the peloton now, so the leaders can take some extra seconds with 25 km to go! Potocki wins the penultimate KoM-sprint of the dat ahead of Kebede and Raileanu, while Gallopin might not come back to the head of the race again. Raileanu now leads the KoM-classification, and normally can’t lose it anymore! Great ride from the Moldovan for home team Fablok – Chocolate Jacques! Peloton at 1’30”.
15 km to go and it’s game over for Gallopin! Aasvold and the Kraftwerk riders now at the head of the peloton, with 3.5 km left to climb on the last categorized climb of the day. Of course, the finish is uphill as well. The three leaders now have a 50” lead over the peloton.
500 metres left to climb and still 11.5 km until the finish, but white jersey Areruya already reeling the leaders back in! It’s very cloudy here in Poland, so we’ll soon see what havoc was caused by the acceleration of the Xero-rider!
He sits back down, most of the KoM-points go to Potocki and Raileanu. 11 km to go and around 65 riders still in contention for today’s win!
10 km remaining and some interesting riders can’t follow the pace after all! The most important names not present at the front are now Bilbao, Chamorro, Jang, Moazemi, Klemme, Duarte, Min, Denz, Schreurs, Bester, Betancourt and Benoot. The last three are not completely out of contention yet, but need to come back quickly if they still want to have a shot at the win today.
The leading duo have a lead of 20” over the 37 chasers with 5 km to go! At the back of that peloton of 37 we see Kump. Surely he wouldn’t be able to make his way to the front and sprint to victory uphill after being dropped and having worked to bring back his teammate not too long ago?
3 km to go and the leading duo has extended its lead to 40”! Pomoshnikov seems to start the lead-out for Cattaneo now, while at the back of this group Schreurs, Bester, Betancourt and Benoot have come back.
The leaders hit a wall and stood still. Pomoshnikov takes the lead with 2.5 km left, being followed by his leader and the Fablok duo Bernard – Rumac. Just behind them we see Slagter and Krizek, while green jersey Kump is moving up some places as well!
Kump sitting down with 2 km to go while the Fablok duo is losing some places and has been replaced by Goh and Gesink from Duolingo. Yellow jersey Bennett and teammate Meurisse up front as well. Scarponi in fifth position, with Uwizeyimana, Senni and Guldhammer around tenth position!
1.5 km to go and the first four have a small gap over the rest! Kump hasn’t given up yet, with Warbasse entering the top-15 now! De la Cruz seems to be in trouble and is at risk of losing time!
As the riders go under the flamme rouge the positions haven’t changed that much. One thing is for certain now though: Kump won’t win it. The Slovenian loses a lot of places very quickly.
500 metres to go and the sprint has really begun now! Cattaneo seems to be overtaken quickly by Gesink, with Guldhammer and yellow jersey Bennett on the right side of the road!
The Mapei rider takes the lead with 300 metres to go! Uwizeyimana and Slagter in fifth and sixth, can they overrule the Dane?
Gesink back in the lead with less than 200 metres to go! Some valuable seconds are now in reach for the Dutchman! (and the stage win as well, let’s not forget about that.)
And he holds on! Uwizeyimana came close but will have to be content with a second place, while yellow jersey Bennett grabs a podium place and some more bonus seconds ahead of Guldhammer and Cattaneo. The other top-10 places go to Senni, Slagter, Denifl, Warbasse and Yates. Several riders lost touch with the first group in the peloton and lose 30 seconds. Those are Meurisse, Nepomnyachsniy, De la Cruz, Betancourt, Novak and Scarponi. Then, Eg and Schreurs lose 57”, while Fabbro loses 1’11”.
