Jakub Mareczko of Southeast outsprinted Lampre-Merida’s Sacha Modolo on the final day of the 52nd Presidential Tour of Turkey to equal his compatriot’s haul of stage victories in the pre-Giro d’Italia event. Portugal’s José Gonçalves of Caja Rural-RGA comfortably retained the overall lead to claim his first international stage race at the age of 27.
“This is an important victory in my career as I want to join a World Tour team,” Gonçalves explained. “I feel a bit of frustration for not taking the form I have now to the Giro but our team hasn’t been invited. However, the next big goal will be the Vuelta a España, where I expect to share the captaincy with Pello Bilbao. I’m an all-rounder and I want to capitalize on this victory in Turkey to improve my potential. This is a very nice race. I’m delighted with the experience.”
The last stage concluded in Selçuk, where the TUR has had an uphill finish in the past three editions, but it was a flat finish this time around. The uphill exit of the sea side city of Marmaris enabled four riders to break away: Muhammat Atalay (Torku), Nicolas Baldo (Roth), Alessandro Malaguti (Unieuro) and Jan Hirt (CCC Sprandi Polkowice). For most of the race, they cruised with an advantage of 2:30 over the bunch led by Lampre-Merida but the Italian team gave up with 40km to and the time gap went out.
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Baldo got dropped when Atalay, Malaguti and Hirt sped up to reach a maximum lead of 5.50 with 29km remaining into the last stage.
Astana City, the team of surprise third-place finisher Nikita Stalnov – he went by Umerbekov, his father’s name, until he changed for his mother’s name last year – was first to react. Lotto-Soudal also realized the danger and Lampre-Merida pulled again with 15km to go. It was all together again 12km before the finish in Selçuk.
A few attacks took place in the finale but a bunch sprint finish was inevitable. “I was guided by my teammates Eugert Zhupa, Liam Bertazzo and Manuel Belletti.” Mareczko explained. “300 metres before the line, I was on Modolo’s wheel and I managed to pass him. It’s a big satisfaction because today’s stage wasn’t flat. It didn’t exactly suit my characteristics. The team tremendously helped me in the hills, particularly in the long climb at the beginning. Having learned from yesterday, we rode uphill at the front of the bunch so I was able to crest the summit in the middle of the bunch and not get dropped.
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