Richie Porte (BMC) grabbed overall victory at the Tour de Romandie on Sunday with a strong performance on the final-day time trial to depose overnight race leader Simon Yates (Orica-Scott)
Primoz Roglic (LottoNL-Jumbo) tore through the largely downhill second half of the 17.8km Lausanne course to win the stage and haul himself from sixth up onto the podium.
After Porte and Yates skipped away on Saturday's queen stage, the final-day tussle for the title looked like a two-way battle, and Porte needed to make up 19 seconds on the young Brit. The former Australian national time trial champion found all that and more by the intermediate checkpoint at 6.5km, towards the top of the uphill opening section of the course, and it became clear which way the result would be going.
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Yates still produced a strong ride - and he needed to, given the charge of Roglic. The Slovenian, who is going from strength to strength as a week-long racer, was strong on the uphill section but he covered the second half of the course in blistering fashion, taking every risk he could to hit the highest possible speeds on the downhill. He stopped the clock on 24:58, which, at the time, was an amazing 32 seconds better than the leader in the clubhouse, Tejay Van Garderen.
If Porte was never really in trouble, himself setting 25:06, then Yates would have to start worrying about second place rather than the yellow jersey. In the end he set 25:46, leaving him 21 seconds down on Porte in the overall standings, but five seconds clear of Roglic on the podium.
"It’s a massive shock to be honest," said Porte. "i didn't think i’d be able to claw that much time back. I tip my hat to my teammates for all the work they’ve done this week. Also Yates, he’s a super talent, he rolled my yesterday in the stage so it was sweet to get the victory today. He won the battle but I won the war a little bit there. It’s just nice to keep the momentum rolling before July."
How it unfolded
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
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