Tirreno-Adriatico (Stage 5) Castellalto >> Castelfidardo (205k)
Mathieu van der Poel has won the “Queen Stage” in the Tirreno-Adriatico in his own way. The Dutch champion completed a long solo of 50 kilometers, although Tadej Pogacar came very close. Van Aert clung on for 3rd. In the battle for the overall victory, Pogacar has done an amazing job, he added another 40sec extra to his lead against Wout van Aert with 2 stages to go including Tuesday’s Time Trial. Ryan Mullen came in safely within the “cutting” time in a big group 27 minutes down.
Paris-Nice Final stage (8) Le Plan-du-Var >> Levens (92.7k)
Primoz Roglic was unable to hold on to his yellow leader’s jersey until the finish, a bit of a “Deja Vue” as this happened also in the TDF last year! In the final stage of Paris-Nice, the Slovenian top cyclist had a bad day, with 2 crashes and a bike change…talking about bad luck…he didn’t give up and chased with cuts and bruises on his hips, a tuff Slovenian to say the least, but to no avail..the yellow was gone!! The German Max Schachmann (BORA-Hansgrohe) took the overall victory, just like he did in 2020. The stage win went to Education-Nipo’s Magnus Cort Nielsen. Poor Primoz ended up 15th in the final GC….how one day can turn things around!! Sam Bennett kept his second place in the Points GC, he was 38th today 1m39s down to the winner and was for a long time in the chasing bunch who scattered in the final 20km.
