Paris-Nice sees our Sam doing his thing again, today his team delivers him with such perfection, and not a soul in the world can beat Sam’s turn of speed when this happens!!
The many chatters in the peloton resulted in a Belgian conspiracy 70 kilometers from the end. Eleven compatriots of mine had apparently secretly consulted and suddenly stormed away. It could have been the start of a miraculous final phase, but due to the disturbance of Deceuninck riders Lampaert and Declercq, they were called to order by the bunch after a few miles…It lightnings up the 200km stage a bit, and actually a very funny moment in the boring stage! But it came to the finale and Sam Bennet’s Deceuninck -Quickstep train!!
In the final, the speed went up as expected. In combination with the many traffic furniture, there were some crashes! Tony Martin was the worst off. He left the race after the finish with a suspected concussion. With all those fresh riders we got a furious sprint preparation. Deceuninck-Quick Step underlined his superiority by hitting the “Flamme rouge” first with 3 riders plus our green man Bennett. Bouhanni made another fierce attempt to remount Bennett, but it was an impossible task for the Frenchman and Sam won his 2nd stage. He leads the points GC again but with 9 points ahead of Roglic it will be hard to keep it on his shoulders for the remainder…but hey…2 wins is 2 wins!! Ryan Mullen (Trek-Segafredo) came in safely 13 minutes down after working hard for his team in the first half of the race
Parijs – Nice GC after stage 5
1 Primož Roglic TJV 18:42:46
2 Maximilian Schachmann BOH +31
3 Brandon McNulty UAD +37
4 Ion Izagirre AST +40
5 Aleksander Vlasov AST +41
6 Matteo Jorgenson MOV +56
7 Tiesj Benoot DSM +1:04
8 Lucas Hamilton BEX +1:08
9 Luis León Sánchez AST +1:11
10 Pierre Latour TDE +1:12
World Champ Alaphilippe floors Van der Poel and Van Aert on the second stage of the Tirreno – Adriatico and makes it a double for the Deceuninck-Quickstep on this memorable day of finesse and strength
In Italy Julian Alaphilippe has won the second stage in Tirreno-Adriatico. The world champion rushed past his teammate João Almeida in the final meters. Mathieu van der Poel sprinted to second place after a spectacular final, ahead of Wout van Aert, who remains the leader. A wee glass of champagne will be in order for the Deceuninck-Quickstep team tonight at both teams
Tirreno – Adriatico GC after stage 2
1 Wout van Aert TJV 8:37:35
2 Julian Alaphilippe DQT +4
3 Mathieu van der Poel AFC +8
4 Pavel Sivakov IGD +11
5 Mikel Landa TBV +13
6 Andrea Vendrame ACT +14
7 Robert Stannard BEX +14
8 João Almeida DQT +14
9 Tadej Pogacar UAD +14
10 Alex Aranburu AST +14
