photo credits @Tirreno-Adriatico
Michael Valgren (EF Education-EasyPost) took an impressive victory in stage 5 of the Tirreno-Adriatico today, after the Danish rider steadily applied enough pressure to whittle down what remained of the day’s breakaway group before going solo, later fending off a late charge by Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike) during the final kilometer to seize the day’s honors.
Race Highlights
It took 30 kilometers of racing before a small breakaway group containing Edward Planckaert (Alpecin-Premier Tech), Jack Haig (Ineos Grenadiers), Sjoerd Bax (Pinarello-Q36.5), Sean Flynn (Picnic-PostNL) and Joan Bou (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) eventually rode clear of the peloton, with Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor), Georg Zimmermann (Lotto-Intermarché) and Emiel Verstrynge (Alpecin-Premier Tech) later bridging their way to the quintet.
From there, the escapees’ opened up an advantage of around five minutes over the peloton. However, with 60 kilometers go, their gap fell significantly as they reached the final three climbs.
With 26 kilometers to go, Valgren attacked, a move that was initially marked only by Alaphilippe. However, the Frenchman later cracked at the base of the final climb, with Valgren going solo.
Meanwhile, back in the peloton, a lull fell over the group, with seemingly no one motivated to try and reel in Valgren on the final climb, until Del Toro decided to unleash a couple of attacks that saw the Mexican rider come within 11 seconds of catching the Dane.
Yet, despite failing to rein in Valgren, Del Tore was able to take solace in the fact that he regained the overall race lead, who now leads Giulio Pellizzari and Jorgenson by 23 and 34 seconds, respectively.
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