photo credits @WTFK
Jordi Meeus sprinted to victory in stage 6 of the Tour de Suisse today, beating Davide Ballerini and Lewis Askey in Neuhausen am Rheinfall.
After the day’s three-man breakaway containing Stefan Küng (Groupama-FDJ), Mauro Schmid (Jayco-AlUla) and Harry Sweeny (EF Education-EasyPost) was finally caught within the final two kilometers, Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe upped the pace as the peloton got set for a high octane sprint finish.
Earlier, the trio broke away from the peloton shortly after the start in Chur, only to be joined by Küng’s French teammate Romain Grégoire, who had lost the leader’s jersey on the queen’s stage the day before.
From there, the escapees built up a maximum advantage of two and a half minutes.
When Grégoire lost his strength around 45 km before the finish, an exciting chase race developed on the approach to Schaffhausen between the remaining breakaway trio and the long-drawn-out peloton. The trio’s lead – which was still around one and a half minutes – melted away second by second before the peloton caught up in the final kilometer. Even Schmid’s final surge went unrewarded and the day’s winner was decided in a bunch sprint.
There were no changes in the overall classification. Frenchman Kévin Vauquelin continues to lead by 29 seconds ahead of compatriot Julian Alaphilippe and 39 ahead of top favorite João Almeida.
Finale on Lake Lucerne
From the Rhine Falls, the largest waterfall in Europe, the race continues towards Lake Lucerne, where the 88th Tour de Suisse will conclude this weekend.
Tomorrow, the longest stage of this tour is on the program with 207.3 km, which ends with an almost 4 km long final climb to Emmetten. The final mountain time trial from Beckenried up to the Stockhütte follows on Sunday.
