Kittel marginally wins Abu Dhabi Tour stage two ahead of Ewan
Quick-Step Floors' Marcel Kittel left it late to pip the already celebrating Caleb Ewan of Orica Scott to victory and the move up to second overall on stage two of the Abu Dhabi Tour.
Kittel, who had to be paced back to the peloton after a puncture in the latter stages of the race, was keen to atone for his poor finish to stage one, and did so but not exactly emphatically. Ewan opened up his sprint very early but looked assured of victory until Kittel powered past the little Australian on the line, who had prematurely began celebrating.
Dimension Data's Mark Cavendish retains the overall red jersey and green sprinters jersey, while Kittel moves to second, four seconds behind. Marco Canola, with two intermediate sprint wins on stage two, takes the black intermediate sprinters jersey and Ewan wears the white young riders jersey.
Stage two - an entirely suburban 153 kilometre race round Abu Dhabi finishing at Al Marina in the far west of the city - was the final opportunity for a sprint victory before the mountainous stage three tomorrow. Unsurprisingly, a six man break was quick to assert itself and almost went the distance in what probably was a rather tense few kilometres for the sprint teams.
Marco Canola of Nippo - Vini Fantini was the victor at the first intermediate sprint after 53km, ahead of Team Novo Nordisk's Fabio Calabria and UAE Abu Dhabi's Kristijan Durasek.
While the break's advantage to the peloton never rose much over two minutes, the main field were maintaining a high 45 kph average speed, meaning those in the break had to work even harder not to be reeled in. At the second intermediate sprint Canola once again took maximum points and bonus seconds, this time ahead of Bardiani's Nicola Boem and Gazprom-RusVelo's Kirill Sveshnikov.
Nearing the last ten kilometres the break still had 22 seconds but surely it would only be a matter of time before they were caught. While four of the escapees called it quits inside ten kilometres, Canola and BMC Racing's Alessandro De Marchi decided to test themselves against the on rushing horse power of the peloton.
The two survived another seven kilometres in front of the outstretched jaws of the Quick-Step and Team Sky driven peloton but were eventually snapped up with two and a half kilometres remaining - very nearly a repeat of the same stage last year where the breakaway were insight of the finish before they were caught.
Without any crashes this time round there were a plethora of world class sprinters vying for the stage win, including Kittel, Ewan, Cavendish and Team Sky's Elia Viviani.
Ewan lit up his bid for the line quite early and was only being contested by Cavendish until the final few metres of the race, when Kittel stormed past to pip the Aussie by inches while he was beginning his celebrations: a lesson if ever there was one to only celebrate once you've actually crossed the line.
Stage three is one for the climbers. While pan flat for most of its 140km, it finishes with a brutal ascent of Jebel Hafeet - the most well-known mountain in the UAE - which is 11.7km long and is 1025 metres above sea level.
 |
| Credit: cyclingweekly.co.uk |
Dimension Data's Mark Cavendish retains the overall red jersey and green sprinters jersey, while Kittel moves to second, four seconds behind. Marco Canola, with two intermediate sprint wins on stage two, takes the black intermediate sprinters jersey and Ewan wears the white young riders jersey.
Stage two - an entirely suburban 153 kilometre race round Abu Dhabi finishing at Al Marina in the far west of the city - was the final opportunity for a sprint victory before the mountainous stage three tomorrow. Unsurprisingly, a six man break was quick to assert itself and almost went the distance in what probably was a rather tense few kilometres for the sprint teams.
Marco Canola of Nippo - Vini Fantini was the victor at the first intermediate sprint after 53km, ahead of Team Novo Nordisk's Fabio Calabria and UAE Abu Dhabi's Kristijan Durasek.
While the break's advantage to the peloton never rose much over two minutes, the main field were maintaining a high 45 kph average speed, meaning those in the break had to work even harder not to be reeled in. At the second intermediate sprint Canola once again took maximum points and bonus seconds, this time ahead of Bardiani's Nicola Boem and Gazprom-RusVelo's Kirill Sveshnikov.
Nearing the last ten kilometres the break still had 22 seconds but surely it would only be a matter of time before they were caught. While four of the escapees called it quits inside ten kilometres, Canola and BMC Racing's Alessandro De Marchi decided to test themselves against the on rushing horse power of the peloton.
The two survived another seven kilometres in front of the outstretched jaws of the Quick-Step and Team Sky driven peloton but were eventually snapped up with two and a half kilometres remaining - very nearly a repeat of the same stage last year where the breakaway were insight of the finish before they were caught.
Without any crashes this time round there were a plethora of world class sprinters vying for the stage win, including Kittel, Ewan, Cavendish and Team Sky's Elia Viviani.
Ewan lit up his bid for the line quite early and was only being contested by Cavendish until the final few metres of the race, when Kittel stormed past to pip the Aussie by inches while he was beginning his celebrations: a lesson if ever there was one to only celebrate once you've actually crossed the line.
Stage three is one for the climbers. While pan flat for most of its 140km, it finishes with a brutal ascent of Jebel Hafeet - the most well-known mountain in the UAE - which is 11.7km long and is 1025 metres above sea level.
Comments
Post a Comment