Wout Poels (Team Sky) won his third-ever Tour of Britain stage, distancing everyone else to win alone atop Haytor on stage 6. The victory is Poels’ second consecutive queen stage victory after taking victory on Hartside Fell in last year’s race.
Rohan Dennis (BMC) and Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) had stayed with Poels for some time but had no answer when the Dutch rider pushed on with just over a kilometre to go.
Race leader Julian Vermote (Etixx-QuickStep) cracked early on the final climb and lost almost two minutes by the time he hit the top, handing the yellow jersey to Stephen Cummings (Dimension Data).
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After catching the last rider from the day’s break with 10 kilometres remaining, the general classification teams moved to the fore with Team Sky, Cannondale-Drapac and BMC all present at the front of the peloton. Dennis broke the stalemate as the race approached the final ascent to Haytor. The Australian got a few metres before being joined by Poels and Dumoulin, and then Gorka Izagirre (Movistar). Dennis’ injection of pace put the yellow jersey Vermote immediately in trouble but he would get no help from his teammates who looked to set up Dan Martin for the victory.
Cummings bridged the gap to the leaders along with Tony Gallopin (Lotto-Soudal) only to be dropped when Dumoulin put on a bit effort on the front. Poels was able to keep with his compatriot and made his own move with 1.5 kilometres to go. Dennis and Dumoulin began to close on him in the final 500 metres, but he had already done enough to secure himself a another stage win at the Tour of Britain.
“It’s the third one [at the Tour of Britain] already and sixth of the season. It’s going really good this season. It’s always nice to win in the Tour of Britain. It’s a really nice race and the crowds are great,” said Poels. “We took control a little bit at the end and we wanted to close the gap to go for the stage win with. Yogi [Ian Stannard] and Danny did a really good job.”
Watch the Tour of Britain stage 6 highlights video
How it happened
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