Dennis retains leader's jersey in Romandie Queen stage
BORA - hansgrohe goes 1-2 with Sergio Higuita and Aleks Vlasov after a reduced bunch sprint
The 180 km long queen stage between Aigle and Zinal featured five first category climbs, with the favourites having to lay their cards on the table, as the time gaps were not too large.
A group of twelve escapees gathered a four-minute lead. Gijs Leemreize, Timo Roosen and Michel Hessmann were strong today. The trio rode in the lead of the pack for several kilometres. Thanks to the trio, the leading group never got a big lead. Classification leader Dennis was surrounded by several teammates throughout the stage.
After the first half of the race, several of the breakaway riders dropped back to the peloton, while the remaining leaders headed for the finale with an advantage of three minutes.
As the challenging stage’s final climbs approached, Robert Gesink, Steven Kruijswijk and Sepp Kuss took control of the race. With a strong effort, the latter ensured a considerably thinned peloton on the last climb. Dennis showed that he wanted to go for the stage victory in the last kilometres.
With about 200m remaining, Sergio opened his sprint and wasn’t able to be caught by the rest. Aleks Vlasov sprinted to second place behind his Colombian champion teammate, and ensured a BORA-hansgrohe 1-2 on the stage. Ahead of tomorrow's final time trial, Aleks thereby also moved up 8 places to third overall, 18 seconds behind the overall leader.
In an explosive sprint on an ascending road, the Australian finished eleventh, three seconds behind stage winner Sergio Higuita. Dennis is fifteen seconds ahead of his first competitor in the general classification.
The final stage on the Tour de Romandie is an ITT of 15.8 kilometres long. The first third is flat, the rest of the route is a trying climb to the line. The first rider starts at 12.28 and the last one is expected to finish around 15.45 – both are local times (CEST)
VIDEO: 2022 Tour de Romandie Stage 4 Highlights
2022 Tour de Romandie Stage 4 Top 10
1. Sergio Higuita (Col) Bora-Hansgrohe, in 5-58-52
2. Aleksandr Vlasov (Rus) Bora-Hansgrohe, all same time
3. Juan Ayuso (Esp) UAE Team Emirates
4. Ben O'Connor (Aus) AG2R Citroen Team
5. Thibaut Pinot (Fra) Groupama FDJ
6. Michael Woods (Can) Israel Premier Tech
7. Gino Mäder (Swi) Bahrain Victorius
8. Sébastien Reichenbach (Swi) Groupama FDJ
9. Simon Geschke (Ger) Cofidis
10. Carlos Verona (Esp) Movistar
2022 Tour de Romandie GC after Stage 4
1. Rohan Dennis (Aus) Jumbo Visma, 17-27-01
2. Juan Ayuso (Esp) UAE Team Emirates, at 15secs
3. Aleksandr Vlasov (Rus) Bora-Hansgrohe, at 18secs
4. Ben O'Connor (Aus) AG2R Citroen Team, at 25secs
5. Lucas Plapp (Aus) Ineos Grenadiers, at 30secs
6. Gino Mäder (Swi) Bahrain Victorius, at 32secs
7. Sébastien Reichenbach (Swi) Groupama FDJ, at 37secs
8. Neilson Powless (Usa) EF Education-EasyPost, at 41secs
9. Simon Geschke (Ger) Cofidis, at 42secs
10. Steff Cras (Bel) Lotto-Soudal, at 45secs