View Luxembourg: Madouas yellow defense
Aaron Gate (Bolton Equities Black Spoke) won stage 3 of the Tour of Luxembourg. | Photo: Cor Vos
09/15/2022 | (rsn) – Aaron Gate of the 3rd Division Bolton Equities Black Spoke humiliated the WorldTour team in the final stage of the 3rd stage of the 82nd Tour of Luxembourg (2nd Pro). The 31-year-old New Zealander was the only one to respond to a late attack by Benjamin Thomas (Cofidis) on the final 188.4km stretch from Rosport to Diekirch and shortly afterwards took a stunning sprint win against the Frenchman.
“I’m hoping for a place in the top ten overall here, a stage win. of being a dream. But after the Tour of Romania on Sunday we had only one day’s rest and that’s why our legs were still heavy in the first two stages, “Gate, track specialist about his emotional fourth victory of the season on the road. “My friend and rival, Benjamin Thomas, attacked hard in the last kilometer and I caught his rear wheel. When I looked about 200 meters from the finish line, I could hardly believe it and then I ran full speed.”
Behind the leading pair, Davide Ballerini (Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl) from Italy took third place in the race ahead of his compatriot Matteo Trentin (UAE Team Emirates), who won the stage yesterday. Fifth place is Ballerini’s French teammate Florian Senechal.
Open winner Valentin Madouas (Groupama -FDJ) defended his yellow jersey and is entering tomorrow’s test as the overall leader. The Dutchman Sjoerd Bax (Alpecin – Deceuninck) was in second place for 7 seconds, 8 seconds behind the French Trentin and the winner of the day Gate. in third and fourth place.
Trentin maintains the top position in the points classification, the Spaniard Joel Nicolau (Caja Rural) extends his lead in the mountain classification, the Frenchman Bastien Tronchon (AG2R Citroën) remains the leader of the junior classification.
Here’s how the contest goes:
Shortly after the start in Rosport, a group of nine experienced Pierre Rolland (B&B Hotels – KTM), Nicolau and Gil Gelders (Bingoal Pauwels Sauces), who were second in the mountain classification, pulled away and took the top leader approx. 3:30 minutes. Nicolau won the first two of the four mountain classifications the previous day in Gelders and thus extended his lead to the Belgians.
In the field, Groupama – FDJ quickly replaced the UAE Emirates team in the leadership role and reduced the gap according to the plan. With 30 kilometers to go, it was 1:30 minutes, with UAE and Trek – Segafredo running only eight separate again.
At the second intermediate sprint in Diekirch, which, like, won the first time in Rosport Rolland, the field is almost in the eyes of the escape, who is finally caught in front of Héndelbierg with 17 kilometers to go. Groupama – FDJ controlled the event on the two-kilometer long climb with a good gradient of 6 percent, but was knocked out of the lead shortly before the mountain classification, which Victor Koretzky (B & B Hotels) secured.
Madouas’ teammate, Kevin Geniets, battled his way to the top of the 1.5-kilometer and 21-kilometer climb and even tore through a small gap. Shortly before the classification of the mountains, Madouas then counterattacked – compared to the strategy of Groupama in his opening victory – which reduced the leading group to only about 25 riders.
On the descent, Matias Skjelmose Jensen (Trek – Segafredo) attacked and scored a 10 second lead. But when, five kilometers from the finish, the other drivers caught up with the running group, Quick-Step, UAE and Alpecin – Deceuninck quickly managed to catch up and catch the young Dane just less than a kilometer from the finish.
But then Thomas surprised the sprinter team with his start, which only Gate could follow. Both defended their narrow lead into the home stretch, where Gate was confident of his greatest success to date as a road professional in the race.
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