BMC's Richie Porte wins Stage 2 after Solo Attack Down Under
Richie Porte of BMC Racing Team is the new leader of the Tour Down Under after finishing solo to win the second stage
Porte launched an attack at the base of the Paracombe climb and crossed the finish line 16 seconds ahead of Movistar's Gorka Izagirre Insausti and Orica-Scott's Esteban Chaves.
The top five was completed by Porte's teammate Rohan Dennis and Dimension Data's Nathan Haas.
In the general classification, with four stages to go, Porte now has a 20-second lead over Izagirre with Chaves trailing by another two seconds.
"The BMC Racing Team boys were just incredible this morning. They really looked after me the whole day and it's nice to win on Paracombe," said stage winner Porte. "It's good to get a win already this season and now we'll try and defend this jersey."
"We started with the five laps around Stirling. We didn't really race it that hard which is a bit of a shame but at the end of the day I think I have a good gap on the General Classification. I know it's not over with a few quite hard stages remaining. The team are fantastic and strong so I'm quite confident."
"I know I've got good climbing legs and I didn't really want to wait around so to be able to ride away like that gives me good confidence."
The win is Porte's fourth at the Tour Down Under, having already won one stage each in the last three editions.
Porte is clearly in good form, he was seen at the finish of the second stage looking really "ripped".
Tour Down Under Results Stage 2
Stage 2 Stirling - Paracombe (2017-01-18)
1. Richie PORTE BMC 3:46:06
2. Gorka IZAGIRRE INSAUSTI MOV +16
3. Johan Esteban CHAVES RUBIO ORS +16
4. Rohan DENNIS BMC +19
5. Nathan HAAS DDD +19
6. Diego ULISSI UAD +19
7. Rúben GUERREIRO TFS +19
8. Michael STORER AUS +19
9. Michael WOODS CDT +19
10. Luis Leon SANCHEZ GIL AST +19
Tour Down Under General Clasification after Stage 2
1 Richie Porte (Aus) BMC Racing Team 7:10:14
2 Gorka Izagirre (Esp) Movistar Team at 0:20
3 Esteban Chaves (Col) Orica-Scott 0:22
4 Jay McCarthy (Aus) Bora-Hansgrohe 0:24
5 Nathan Haas (Aus) Dimension Data 0:27
6 Diego Ulissi (Ita) Team UAE Abu Dhabi 0:29
7 Nathan Earle (Aus) UniSA-Australia
8 Rohan Dennis (Aus) BMC Racing Team
9 Luis León Sánchez (Esp) Astana Pro Team
10 Rafael Valls (Esp) Lotto Soudal
11 Robert Gesink (Ned) Team LottoNL-Jumbo
12 Domenico Pozzovivo (Ita) AG2R La Mondiale
13 Wilco Kelderman (Ned) Team Sunweb
14 Ruben Guerreiro (Por) Trek-Segafredo
15 Sergio Luis Henao Montoya (Col) Team Sky
16 Michael Woods (Can) Cannondale-Drapac
17 Enric Mas (Esp) Quick-Step Floors
18 Michael Storer (Aus) UniSA-Australia
19 Jhonatan Restrepo (Col) Katusha-Alpecin