A curious edition of Tirreno-Adriatico took another twist on its penultimate day in Cepagatti as Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) out-sprinted world champion Peter Sagan (Tinkoff) from a small breakaway group to claim stage victory and move into the overall lead.
If the cancellation of Sunday’s stage to Monte San Vicino had presented the likes Van Avermaet, Sagan and Zdenek Stybar (Etixx-QuickStep) with an unexpected opportunity to win the race overall, they demonstrated on Monday that they had every intention of grabbing it.
The trio were part of an elite eight-rider group that cannily snuck off the front on the first of two laps around the finishing circuit in Cepagatti. Together with Michal Kwiatkowski (Sky), they were the final survivors, fending off the furious pursuit behind to fight it out for stage honours.
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Kwiatkowski made a long, searing effort in the final kilometre that burnt off first Fernando Gaviria (Etixx-QuickStep) and then the race leader Stybar, before Sagan sprung into life and careered past him with 200 metres to go.
After a string of near misses, it seemed as though the world champion, today wearing the red points jersey, was going to land his first win since claiming the world title in Richmond last year, but Van Avermaet – no longer, it seems, the eternal second – fought back to come around Sagan at the death.
In truth, Van Avermaet had contributed the least in the eight-man move that was powered by Tinkoff and the Etixx-QuickStep trio of Stybar, Gaviria and Matteo Trentin. With teammate Tejay van Garderen, on the same time as him overall and a far stronger time triallist, in the chasing peloton, Van Avermaet felt he had a cast-iron alibi.
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