April 25/12 9:59 am - Tour of Turkey, Stage 4 report, photos and results

Posted by Editoress on 04/25/12
 

Team SpiderTech Director Steve Bauer remarked before the start of the fourth stage of the Tour of Turkey that he expected it to be an aggressive race, as teams probed for weaknesses in the squad of new race leader Ivailo Gabrovski (Konya Torku Seker Spor - Vivelo).  In the end, after a race-long breakaway, all the top contenders held onto their positions in the general classification, including SpiderTech's Will Routley in tenth.  Mark Renshaw took his first victory of the year for his new squad Rabobank, just edging out Points leader Matt Goss (GreenEdge), who has now finished second in three out of four stages.

Renshaw and Goss sprint

The 134 kilometre stage between Fethiye and Marmaris was much harder than it looked on paper.  The Category 2 climb early in the race was possibly harder than the first Category 1 climb the day before and, afterwards, riders were subjected to a series of long grinding climbs, followed by swift descents.  The final climb came within five kilometres of the finish line, and only 56 of 182 finishers finished with the same time as the winner.

The initial break began almost immediately after the race cleared the start town, with Assan Bazayev (Astana), Mikhail Ignatyev (Katusha) and Diego Caccia (Farnese Vini) attacking.  Gabrovski was very aggressive chasing attacks down, and the action began to drop riders almost immediately, including members of Gabrovski's team, who were not up to the challenge.

Eventually, four riders broke clear - Bazayev, Ignatyev, Caccia and Vladimir Gusev, team mate to Ignatyev.  The foursome began to open a gap as the remaining team mates of Gabrovski struggled to ride tempo at the front of the race.  As the split approached three minutes, other top placed teams realized that they needed to assist the Torku riders, and sent riders to the front.

Diego Caccia was the last member of the break to get caught

The gap began to fall, finally, in the last 20 kilometres, the last rider out in front - Caccia - was caught on the slopes of the final climb.  Colnago-CSF Inox went to the front to set up a train for their man Sacha Modolo, but the length of the climb caught the sprint teams by surprise, and no one could take control.  After a few high speed attempts to get away on the descent, the reduced peloton came into the last 500 metre straightaway together, with Renshaw and Goss in a drag race to the line.  Both threw their bikes, but Renshaw was in front by a tire width to take the win.

Will Routley (Spidertech powered by C10) finished with the front bunch holding onto his 10th position in the GC

Will Routley was the only Canadian to finish with the front bunch, with David Veilleux (Europcar) in the next group, just over a minute down, while the rest of the SpiderTech team came with the large final group at 21:40.

“The start of today’s stage was insane. Everyone wanted to throw in a dig,” said Routley. “When it settled down I had [teammate] Hugo [Houle] there to take care of me. I felt really good on the last two climbs. My legs are sore now - but I think that's the same for everyone.”

Race Note

- There's a quiet background discussion going on about Gabrovski's incredible ride in stage three, when he literally rode away from a selection of WorldTour climbers on the very hard ten kilometre climb to the finish.  Gabrovski is not known as a climber, nor does he have the physique of a climber, however, he has been riding strongly at the front on every climb.  The comments come from the fact that he has twice been found to have a high haematocrit level (and forced to sit out for 15 days), and he rides for a Continental team, that is not subject to the same biological passport program as the WorldTour and Pro Continental teams.  No one is pointing finger, but the talk goes on...

- Starting tomorrow, the riders face back-to-back stages just under 180 kilometres each; the longest of the Tour.  With more climbing of the type seen today, everyone is expecting to see further attacks on Gabrovski's jersey.

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