Time for the last and decisive stage in the Cheshire Cycling Tour! After his amazing exploits on day one, Kasperkiewicz will be having one big challenger for the yellow jersey: Summerhill. The King Power rider has a lead of over two minutes, but will it be enough? Van Baarle will be trying to defend his podium place, but that’s definitely easier said than done on this course. There are less cobbled sectors as in the first stage, but most of them are near the finish line and one of them, which the riders will do three times and also be able to collect KoM-points, is definitely a place to make differences: 5 cobbled uphill kilometres!
At the first intermediate sprint right after the start we have a breakaway of twelve riders. Arashiro will be looking to defend his KoM-jersey, with Cherkasov the only other rider present able to overtake him. To do that, he’ll need to win every KoM and see the Rakuten rider take a maximum of one point. For the possible stage win and increasing some spots in the GC we have Van der Haar, Kuroeda and David, with the other names in the leading group being Culey, Naud, De Witte, Cheung, Min, Allegaert and Postlberger. Two more riders trying to join this group, those are Gallego Martin and Barbero.
The first KoM-sprint of the day is in Gayton. Cherkasov wins it ahead of Min and Arashiro. 15 KoM-points left and the difference between the Rakuten and Desigual rider exactly 15 points. The Russian now fourth in the KoM, three points behind Kasperkiewicz and eleven less than Hermans. So far, everybody has been doing work in the leading group, except for possible stage winner David. The peloton only 3’45” behind with 120 km to the finish line, with the four teams working over there being King Power, Volvo acc. by Spotify, Podium Ambition and Team UBS.
Sibilla (11’) and even more Zepuntke (33’) are far behind in the GC and seem to have agreed to attack together! Understandable, but maybe a bit early, as there are still 90 km to go. The leaders now getting close to their first of three ascents of Bulkerley Hill!
Well, there isn’t a lot of cooperation between the two attackers. Ferreira is also 12’ behind in the GC and attacks as well, but all three of them still 2’ behind the leading group, and the peloton less than a minute behind them.
The first ascent of Bulkerley Hill sees the leading group reduced to 7 with 2 km to climb! The seven riders still at the front are Kuroeda, David, Van der Haar, Naud, Allegaert, Arashiro and De Witte. This means the KoM-classifications seems to be decided, as Cherkasov is left behind! Zepuntke tries to use the cobbles to come closer to the head of the race.
Arashiro not even sprinting at the top of the hill, as he’s already sure of the polka-dots and he rather tries to survive as long as possible! Zepuntke at only a minute now, with the other two attackers already back in the peloton at 3’15”!
Oh boy… On the last centimetres of cobbles, Zepuntke suffers a puncture! A peloton of 120 riders catches him moments later! The biggest names missing in what’s left of the peloton should be Breen and Nepomnyachsniy, both already far behind in the GC. In a couple of km, the riders will already start their second (and penultimate) ascent of Bulkerley Hill!
With 2 km to climb and 63.5 km to the finish line, the seven leaders are the only seven riders left ahead of the peloton of 115, where Podium Ambition reduced the time gap to 2’30” just before the start of the climb. Some bad luck for Theuns though, who suffered a puncture as well! He managed to stay in the peloton, but should try moving up quickly as he’s now the last rider there!
KoM-leader Arashiro drops out of the leading group, but De Witte now also cracks just before the top of Bulkerley Hill! Five leaders left, or is the Fablok rider able to come back quickly?!
1’40” after the five leaders, a peloton of only 40-ish riders comes over the top! Fouquet and Sweeck worked hard to separate the wheat from the chaff, and looking at the top-25 GC and cobblers the most important names missing are Kosic, Neilands, the unlucky Theuns, Gaday, Ferreira, Benoot, Owen, Cominelli, Havik, Ruiz, Budenieks, Moulingui, Lecourt De Billot, Kireva, Kung and Sibilla!
Aha, after the puncture, Theuns has his whole team waiting for him. They seem to bring him back with 50 km to the finish line, as the peloton increases to fifty riders again. Following names, who were just dropped, therefore also make it back to the peloton, which is only 1’10” behind the race lead: Neilands, Benoot, Owen and Kulppi.
Another top-10 rider suffers a puncture! Eritrean champion Debesay (10th) has some bad luck on a long and flat cobbled sector! His team won’t be helping him, as Schreurs has to stay in the leading group next to Rowe!
40 km left and it’s to nobody’s surprise that all Generali domestiques, except for Gaday, had to go overboard on that cobbled sector! The leading group exists of 42 more riders, but Debesay hasn’t given up and tries to come back! Havik (17th) also in this group of seven. The five leaders now have an advantage of 1’45” over the peloton!
Debesay succeeds in his chase and joins the peloton with 35 km to the finish line! Havik hasn’t been able to come back (yet), as the only rider able to follow the Eritrean to the first peloton was, quite surprisingly coming out of nowhere, Van Asbroeck. As you can see though, some more domestiques are not too far behind as the riders near the last ascent of Bulkerley Hill. cycleYorkshire and Andorra now working in the peloton.
The five leaders get some extra seconds at the beginning of the hill! Thinking he has nothing to lose, Zepuntke attacks again with 31 km to the finish line! Altur, ninth in the GC, believes his time has come as well, and tries to follow the Minion!
Allegaert in trouble with 2 km to climb! This seems to leave us with four leaders for now: Kuroeda, David, Van der Haar and Naud! Their first chaser is 1’25” behind!
And that chaser is no longer the German Minion, but Altur! The Spaniard overtook Zepuntke and has a small gap over the peloton, where Summerhill is in second position, with Van Baarle around fifth and yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz seems to be struggling a bit around the 25th place!
1 km to the top of Bulkerley Hill as Van der Haar has to let go of the other leaders as well!
Altur close to catching Allegaert with 1 km to the top of the hill, as the Spaniard is exactly one minute behind the three leaders! 40” behind him the peloton, where Zepuntke has been reeled back in and white jersey Hsu is now in trouble!
The three leaders reach the top of their final ascent of the day! 27 km to the finish line and they have a 45” advantage over Altur!
As yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz has gained some places and seems to survive the last uphill sector of the Cheshire Cycling Tour, Van Baarle has to let go of the peloton of 25 riders! Just behind the Dutchman is Benoot and a bit further white jersey Hsu! Owen still in the group of 25, so he’s now taking a real big shot at conquering the white jersey!
Just after the top, the peloton gets reduced to 20 riders! Zepuntke and Allegaert dropping are no big surprises after their earlier efforts, but also a big bummer for Generali as Gaday and Theuns seem to pay the price for their comeback after the puncture as well! Daniel also dropped, another cobbler with a good sprint less! The peloton at 1’20” of the five leaders, with Altur exactly in between!
Wow! Altur saved his energy on Bulkerley Hill and closes the gap to the three leaders in no time! 22 km and two cobbled sectors to go as the four up front are one minute ahead the peloton of twenty riders. Those twenty riders are Stallaert, Trentin, Spengler, Machado, Summerhil, Blythe, Kump, Van der Haar, Vanmarcke, Vanspeybrouck, Debesay, Kasperkiewicz, Rowe, Fenn, Kulppi, Bohli, Bush, Neilands, Van Keirsbulck and Owen.
David is having none of it and attacks even before the leaders hit some more cobbles! 17.5 km to go and the other two from the original breakaway let Altur do the work to catch the Bennelong rider! The peloton, still with the same twenty riders, 30” behind the chasers and 50” behind David!
12.5 km to the finish line and in the background you can see that Naud and Kuroeda have decided to help chasing leader David! The trio still 20” behind, but the peloton has reduced its pace a bit and now follows at 1’30”! Still two cobbled sectors to go of course, with the final one actually being uphill as well, although very short!
Aha, Platts Lane, penultimate cobbles of the day! Altur back in the lead in the chasing trio and the lead of the Bennelong rider seems to be shrinking!
Altur unsurprisingly leaves Naud and Kuroeda behind and is close to catching David under the flag of the last ten km! The peloton of twenty is 1’30” behind, yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz enjoying this scenario!
Under that same flag, the group of twenty gets split in two! The nine riders on the wrong side of the split are Van der Haar, Bush, Machado, Neilands, Fenn, Kulppi, Owen, Van Keirsbulck and Bohli, who was unlucky and suffered a puncture!
There was a reason for that split, as Summerhill took commando of that group! Yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz and the other nine managed to follow the American though, who reels Naud and Kuroeda back in at the end of the penultimate cobbled sector of the day!
Spengler uses the American’s efforts as a springboard to the head of the race! The Swiss close to joining Altur and David with 7.5 km to the finish line! The third place already seems secured for the UBS rider, as Van Baarle is riding almost 4’ behind! Overtaking Summerhill won’t be easy, as the American has an advantage of two minutes in the GC. Never say never of course!
5 km to the finish line, Spengler has a small gap over Altur and David while Summerhill leads the chase and is only seconds behind! Yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz not leaving the American’s wheel anymore, with also early breakaway riders Naud and Kuroeda holding on well in that group! In 2.5 km we find the last cobbled sector of the Cheshire Cycling Tour, Northgate Street!
Et voila, 4 km to go and we’re back to a leading group of fifteen riders. Belgian champion Stallaert should be one of the best sprinters here together with Trentin, Blythe and Kump, but the Volvo rider doesn’t want to wait and attacks!
The Belgian enters the last 3 km and will start the final cobbled sector of the day with an advantage of twenty seconds over the others, where Trentin attacks and tries to close the gap!
The cobbles on Northgate Street are not the longest or hardest ones, but there’s always a danger of a flat tyre! Trentin comes a couple of seconds closer to Stallaert, who’s already over half of the cobbled sector. In the chasing group of thirteen, Andorra sends Vanspeybrouck in the attack!
2 km to the finish line as Trentin joins Stallaert at the end of the last cobbled sector! Vanspeybrouck is 15” behind, with Altur and Spengler now attacking as well! Some riders of the group of nine which has been dropped earlier are close to making a comeback, with Bush, Kulppi, Owen and Van Keirsbulck as most important names!
1.5 km to go as Vanspeybrouck makes it three riders up front! His leader, Summerhill, seems to have neutralized the attack of Altur and Spengler!
And they’re off under the flamme rouge! Stallaert normally the fastest, but he has been attacking for three km now! Trentin positioned perfectly but the Italian has also given a lot in the last kilometres, while Vanspeybrouck is without a doubt the worst sprinter, but does that even matter at the end of this race and this finale?!
Yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz showing his first real signs of weakness, after he gets dropped together with early breakaway riders Naud and Kuroeda! He has a two minute lead over Summerhill in the GC, will it be enough?!
Last 600 metres for the leading trio! Trentin tries to overtake the Belgian champion from Volvo, as Vanspeybrouck has to leave a gap!
Trentin in the lead with 400 metres to the finish line as Stallaert sits down! Vanspeybrouck not giving up yet, while Rowe is the fourth man in the race at the moment!
200 metres to go for Trentin, with Vanspeybrouck now in second!
And the Italian holds on! The Mapei rider wins the last stage of the Cheshire Cycling Tour ahead of Vanspeybrouck and Stallaert!
After a very strong stage, Kump sprints to a fourth place only moments later, ahead of Blythe and the Xero-duo of Debesay and Rowe, who have had a great Cheshire Cycling Tour as well!
Summerhill then comes in eighth, ahead of Spengler and Vanmarcke, with Altur just outside the top-10.
Yellow jersey Kasperkiewicz then comes in around fifteenth, together with Owen, Bush and Van Keirsbulck.
So, what does this mean for the GC? Kasperkiewicz loses some time to Summerhill, but still has an advantage of 1’30”! The King Power rider wins the Cheshire Cycling Tour! Van Baarle falls from third to thirteenth. Not a great result today, but 13th is of course still very decent for the cycleYorkshire rider. Spengler takes his spot on the podium. Places four to six go to the riders who finished first to third today, in exactly the same order. Summerhill might not have won, but Vanspeybrouck in fifth definitely helped the team to the victory in the teams classification, overtaking King Power. Places seven and eight go to the Xero duo of Rowe and Debesay, obviously a great result for manager jandal. Kump didn’t score big in the three sprint stages, but was incredibly strong both in the first stage and today, he gets awarded by a ninth place in the GC and a third in the points classification, with teammate Van Keirsbulck eleventh. Altur finishes tenth after being very present in today’s race story and trying to grab the win. Manager ManxMissile might be disappointed, but there is also some good news for the team as Owen convincingly wins in the U25 rankings.
Some riders couldn’t make it inside the time limit today, those are Veyhe, Petelin and Anguilet. Thanks for watching/reading, I’ll see some of you soon again in the Vuelta and/or Malopolski, where the PCT cobblers have another chance at showing their skills!
