Mark Cavendish produced a superb sprint to take a second stage victory at the Giro d’Italia for Team Sky.
The Manxman bounced back from a hard crash on Monday in Denmark to take the win, holding off former team-mate Matthew Goss (Orica-GreenEDGE) on the line in a frenetic run to the finish.
The sprinter was able to hold on during a tough and undulating finale, which saw a number of his rivals dropped, before being expertly shepherded to the line by his Team Sky team-mates.
Hitting the front with 10 kilometres to go, the team pulled hard on the front to put together a textbook lead-out into Fano with Rigoberto Uran and Bernhard Eisel passing over to Juan Antonio Flecha, before Peter Kennaugh and Geraint Thomas led Cavendish into the final metres.
The win was made all the more sweet for the 26-year-old with girlfriend Peta Todd and newborn baby daughter Delilah on the line to greet him.
Overnight leader Ramunas Navardauskas (Garmin-Barracuda) finished in the main bunch to maintain his 10-second race lead after five stages while Cavendish is up to fifth overall, with Thomas sixth.
Afterwards Cavendish was understandably delighted with the way the day had panned out, telling www.teamsky.com: "We were able to commit all our guys at the end and we took the race up with 10k to go and it was textbook work from the team. I’m super super happy!
“I’m even more happy because my girlfriend and my daughter are here and I had my daughter on the podium. It’s the first race she’s been to watch me at and I’m so happy to make her proud and win for her here.”
With the help of the team Cavendish was able to position himself well over the tough final climbs and into the finish and he added: “The guys were all around me on the climbs and we started in a good position so I stuck with them. I was never in any trouble. It wasn’t easy at all but I’ve good form and the guys really looked after me there so I was lucky enough to get over it in reasonable condition.
“It wasn’t an easy finish. There was a headwind and I only went with 200 metres to go. It felt like a long time because of that headwind and I could see Gossy’s shadow but I was able to hold him off.”
The race's first road stage in Italy, the 209-kilometre test always looked likely to end in a bunch sprint with only a few small but tough rises to negotiate on the arrow-straight road.
Four riders headed clear on the run out of Modena with Lotto-Belisol team-mates Olivier Kaisen and Brian Bulgac joined by Pier Paolo De Negri (Farnese Vini) and Alessandro De Marchi (Androni Giocattoli).
The quartet saw their advantage pegged at six minutes with Garmin-Barracuda on the front to protect the maglia rosa of Navardauskas.
Heading towards the finish the pace and the nervousness increased in the bunch with a few crashes peppering proceedings.
Previous race leader Taylor Phinney (BMC Racing) again had a tough day, hitting the ground and struggling to regain the tail end of the bunch.
Liquigas-Cannondale arrived on the front as the climbs began with Team Sky sitting just behind to keep Cavendish out of trouble as behind riders, including sprinters Tyler Farrar and Thor Hushovd, began to be dropped from the pack.
De Marchi was the last man to be caught on the run for home as Team Sky took up the pace-setting to launch Cavendish to another superb victory.
No comments:
Post a Comment