It’s hardly the most romantic of races, but for years, Lieuwe Westra had quietly endured an unhappy love affair with the Three Days of De Panne. Dating back to his professional debut with Vacansoleil in 2009, the Dutchman has been a committed performer on the North Sea coast, but had to settle only for near misses, placing second overall in both 2011 and 2012.
Westra missed the last two editions of the race after joining Astana at the beginning of 2014, and absence seemed only to make the heart grow fonder. On the windswept, rain-soaked opener in the Flemish Ardennes on Tuesday, it was Westra who sparked the winning move, punching clear on the Tenbosse.
Faced with an imperious Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) in the eventual three-up sprint in Zottegem, Westra and his Astana teammate Alexey Lutsenko would have to settle for second and third on the stage, but their efforts had essentially reduced the overall picture to a three-way battle.
ADVERTISEMENT
Westra set out on Thursday afternoon’s traditional closing time trial around De Panne in third place overall, with 12 seconds to make up on Kristoff over the 14.2-kilometre course. Memories of those narrow defeats to Sebastien Rosseler (2011) and Sylvain Chavanel (2012) weighed heavily as he warmed up following the morning stage.
“I’ve been so close to victory here a few times, I’ve been second a few times,” Westra said. “I was just so nervous for the last three hours, the palms of my hands were sweating. I was thinking ‘I hope I’m not second again today.’”
At the opening check point, it looked as though Kristoff would just about hold off the Dutchman and claim his second successive overall victory, but Westra was not to be denied this time out. He made up the necessary ground over the back end of the course to place fourth on the stage, three seconds down on winner Maciej Bodnar (Tinkoff), but 25 ahead of Kristoff.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest News http://ift.tt/1SqwAmN
No comments:
Post a Comment