Two Evonik boys receiving three stars from the Latvian hosts. Might be a bit too subjective, but Van Stayen is definitely one of the top favourites for the win here. His best result on Evonik’s soil is fifth, can he do better today?
The riders are ready. Riga in the background, and from here on we’ll go to Jurmala. Did you know one out of three Latvians lives in Riga? The Latvian capital is described as the Paris of the North.
Schäppi could not care less and wants to leave Riga as soon as possible. He attacks and takes Neuman and Tanfield with him. In the background we see Williams¸ Bouchard, Razumov and Eenkhoorn trying to bridge the gap to the attackers and join them.
Neilands denies Eenkhoorn the possibility to join the attack, but the other three succeed, which gives us a leading group of six riders with 170 km to the finish line.
We quickly see some sprinter teams taking control in the peloton: Evonik – ELKO, Podium Ambition, Bennelong – Mitchelton, Bakkafrost, Polar and King Power. The riders don’t seem to be very concentrated on the road, but rather looking around them at the crowd the whole time. No surprise, as Latvia produces more female models per capita than most countries in the world. Only Estonia, Iceland, Lithuania and Denmark rank higher.
We’re almost halfway the race and with 100 km to go the leaders only get 3’30” from the chasing peloton. Some beautiful scenery though, with some astonishing lakes in the background. Did you know Latvia has 12,000 rivers and 3,00 small lakes?
Minions now also helping in the peloton. Not just with any rider, but with home rider Flaksis! As we all know, the Minions love to wear their blue jeans-overalls, and once again, this is no surprise. Jeans were actually invented by the Latvian Jakobs Jufess, when in 1870 he was asked by a costumer to make a strong pair of trousers for her woodcutter husband. Ah, and of course, 75 km left, peloton at 2’45”.
Just when you thought it would be hard to smoothly incorporate some more interesting facts about this country, the race organisation makes sure they go off-trail in one of their many nature parks. They have four national parks, 42 nature parks, 260 nature reserves, and so on. No wonder 54% of the country is forest. 45 km to go and the peloton at only 1’15”.
The boys in pink decide to show the Latvian public how a team time trial should be done. The early break close to being reeled in with 26 km to go, and that’s also the sign for me to stop giving you random yet useful facts about Latvia. What’s that? One more? Friedrich Wilhelm Ostwald is the only Latvian to ever win a Nobel Prize. He won the prize in 1909 for his work on catalysis, chemical equilibria and reaction velocities.
Exactly 20 km to go as there are no more attackers left. A small gap between the 40th-ish place though, but doesn’t seem to be alarming for the ones in the second group.
13 km to the finish line as it’s quite calm in the peloton. Podium Ambition setting the pace and no one having a problem with that. Will we maybe see a late attack to spice things up?
Arashiro sure loves some spice and attacks as there are 11.5 km left! So far, he’s alone!
Reaction by Varga now! Evonik deciding to bet on two horses now, as Stoltz is trying to reach the two leaders as well! Could be a good tactic, interesting to see if the Latvian will cooperate in the leading group, if he gets there of course!
We have a leading group of three riders with 9 km to the finish line! So far Stoltz hasn’t taken over! Gaday tried to join them but failed, the peloton now at 40” already, as Polar and Podium Ambition try to fix the situation!
Bar now attacking as well, as he is between the peloton and the three leaders now going under the flag of the last five km! The peloton only 25” behind though, as Novardianto is now setting the pace to reel the attackers back in! Vesely on the right side in the wind looking for his teammates, while Ewan and Guarnieri are already following the Czech national champion!
3 km to go and the attackers are caught! Rowe now taking over, is that an attack by the Xero rider?! Vesely in seventh position with no teammates ahead of him and many sprinters following his wheel. Those are Ewan, Awang, Guarnieri, Howard, Itami, Van Asbroeck, Lay, Boivin and Hayakawa. Quite at the back we also see Van Stayen, but he still has teammates Dzamastagic and Becis ahead of him. Yates with a decent positioning though, around where Ewan is.
Rowe gets a nice gap with 2.5 km to the finish line! Vesely without teammates and sees everybody looking at each other, so he counterattacks!
2 km to go and Rowe still has a gap, but it’s almost closed down by Vesely now. The Minion not in the best position though, as Ewan has chased him down and brought several sprinters with him: Awang, Guarnieri, Howard, Itami and Van Asbroeck! The Evonik train still a bit behind, but coming closer!
Ewan close to catching the two leaders under the flamme rouge, while some other sprinters made it back behind Van Asbroeck, those are Boivin, Hsu and Zabel! Van Stayen now the one on the left of the sprinting train, as he launches forward with Hayakawa in his wheel!
800 metres left and Van Stayen in second as he flies by an exhausted Vesely and Ewan! Hayakawa still comfortably in the wheel, while Van Asbroeck and Howard now try to follow the Rakuten rider!
Last 600 metres as Van Stayen and Hayakawa have a small gap over the others, with Van Asbroeck in third!
400 metres to go! Could the Belgian actually hang on?! Second and third still the same, the others still having a shot at a good result are Ewan, Itami, Guarnieri, Howard and Lay!
300 metres as Hayakawa now tries overtaking the Evonik rider! Van Asbroeck coming a bit closer as well!
100 metres can make a big difference as Van Asbroeck is now coming close to the lead while entering the last 200 metres! Guarnieri leading in the battle for fourth!
Into the last 100 metres of the race and Van Asbroeck is one bike ahead of the others! Guarnieri and Itami going the fastest now on the right side of the road!
Last fifty metres and even though Van Asbroeck is still in the lead, this will be very close with Guarnieri! Is the Italian able to forget about the Hanko disaster earlier with a win?!
Yes he is! In a thrilling battle he is just faster than Itami, while Van Asbroeck takes a hold of the last podium place!
While Guarnieri is celebrating his win, Van Stayen beats Hayakawa for the fourth place! The other places in the top-10 go to Howard (6th), Lay (7th), Zabel (8th), Hsu (9th) and another Rakuten rider with the strong Arashiro. Yates will be happy with an 11th place ahead of Boivin (12th). In place 13 we find Stoltz, the second Evonik rider. Great depth here from Evonik, with three more riders in the top-30. Ewan and an invisible Manninen will not be happy with places 14 and 15, while Vesely’s failed tactics saw him drop to 25th in the end.
