photo credit @ Tour de Langkawi
excerpts from Tour de Langkawi
Orica GrennEdge’s Caleb Ewan took his second stage win in Le Tour de Langkawi (LTdL) 2015 in a bunch sprint in Stage 6 from Kuantan to Karak today.
Ewan, 21, beat Team Southeast’s Jakub Mareczko to the win as favourite Andrea Guardini faltered to finish fifth on the day, not adding to his record 17 stage wins as predicted by many before the start of the 96.6km stage, the shortest of this year’s race.
The stage saw a four-man breakaway escape from the peloton and were caught with 20km to go as Guardini’s Astana team launched a chase.
The sprint was set-up for Guardini, but he slipped down and only managed to sprint to fifth, as Ewan registered his third win of the year in his first race outside of Australia as a pro.
“It was a good sprint and my team led me out well. I was in a good position to make the jump and I just went for it. I was looking out for Guardini, but then I saw he had some trouble and wasn’t coming up, so I just gave it my all,” said Ewan, who also won Stage Three from Gerik to Tanah Merah on Tuesday.
Ewan’s win meant he also retained the overall lead and the points classification lead, which he will have to defend in the tough Stage 7 from Shah Alam to Frasers Hill tomorrow.
“I can climb a bit on my day, but I’m not a really good climber. I’ll see how it goes, but for sure I will fight to keep the yellow jersey all the way,” said Ewan.
Ewan also stated his intention of keeping both the yellow and blue jerseys until the end in Dataran Merdeka on Sunday, while United Healthcare’s Kiel Reijnen looks in a comfortable position to confirm his king of the mountains jersey win with a big points gap between second placed Natnael Berhane of MTN-Qhubeka and himself in the mountains classification.
There will be a mouthwatering seven-way battle for the Asian riders’ classification in Stage 7 tomorrow with leader Zhang Wen Long of Giant-Champion System holding on to a slim lead with the top seven riders only separated by two seconds.
Second placed Liu Jianpeng of Hengxiang is level on time with Zhang, with third placed Robin Manullang of Pegasus just a second behind, fourth placed Tomohiro Hayakawa of Aisan Racing Team, fifth placed Andrey Zeits of Astana, sixth placed Chelly Aristya and seventh placed Dadi Suryadi, both of Pegasus, are all just 2 seconds off Zhang’s lead.
Stage 7 will feature three tough climbs at Bukit Cherakah, Genting Sempah and the finish at Frasers Hill in a 170km route that will likely decide the 20th winner of LTdL.
Stage 6 Results AUS 1 EWAN, Caleb (ORICA GreenEDGE) 2:14:19 2 MARECZKO Jakub (YEL) AUS 3 SUTTON, Christopher (SKY) COL 4 MOLANO, Sebastián (COLOMBIA) ITA 5 GUARDINI, Andrea (ASTANA) 6 PETACCHI Alessandro (YEL) SVK 7 KOLÁR, Michal (TINKOFF – SAXO) ALG 8 REGUIGUI, Youcef (MTN – QHUBEKA) TUR 9 ORKEN, Ahmet (TORKU SEKERSPOR) INA 10 ISWANA, Arin (PEGASUS CONTINENTAL CYCLING TEAM) FRA 11 FEILLU, Romain (BRETAGNE-SECHE ENVIRONNEMENT) ITA 12 CHICCHI, Francesco (ANDRONI GIOCATTOLI) UKR 13 SURUTKOVYCH, Oleksandr (SYNERGY BAKU) RUS 14 GUSEV, Vladimir (SKYDIVE DUBAI) 15 DAL COL Andrea (YEL) KOR 16 PARK, Sung Baek (KSPO) JPN 17 NAKAJIMA, Yasuharu (AISAN RACING) COL 18 DUQUE, Leonardo Fabio (COLOMBIA) ERI 19 TEKLEHAIMANOT, Daniel (MTN – QHUBEKA) MAS 20 MANAN, Anuar (TERENGGANU)
General Classification after Stage 6 AUS 1 EWAN, Caleb (ORICA GreenEDGE) 21:32:36 ERI 2 BERHANE, Natnael (MTN – QHUBEKA) + 27 ALG 3 REGUIGUI, Youcef (MTN – QHUBEKA) + 30 FRA 4 PERICHON, Pierre-Luc (BRETAGNE-SECHE ENVIRONNEMENT) 5 MANCEBO PEREZ Francisco (SKYDIVE DUBAI) COL 6 DUQUE, Leonardo Fabio (COLOMBIA) + 32 FRA 7 BRUN, Frédéric (BRETAGNE-SECHE ENVIRONNEMENT) + 33 CHN 8 ZHANG, Wenlong (GIANT-CHAMPION SYSTEM) + 34 CHN 9 LIU, Jianpeng (HENGXIANG CYCLING TEAM) INA 10 MANULANG, Robin (PEGASUS CONTINENTAL CYCLING TEAM) + 35 FRA 11 FEILLU, Romain (BRETAGNE-SECHE ENVIRONNEMENT) + 36 ITA 12 CHIRICO, Luca (BARDIANI CSF) ITA 13 AGNOLI, Valerio (ASTANA) COL 14 HENAO GOMEZ, Sebastian (SKY) JPN 15 HAYAKAWA, Tomohiro (AISAN RACING) ERI 16 KUDUS GHEBREMEDHIN, Merhawi (MTN – QHUBEKA) TUN 17 CHTIOUI, Rafaa (SKYDIVE DUBAI) ERI 18 TEKLEHAIMANOT, Daniel (MTN – QHUBEKA) DEN 19 HANSEN, Jesper (TINKOFF – SAXO) KAZ 20 ZEITS, Andrey (ASTANA)
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