André Greipel won the fourth stage of the Eneco Tour. In his red Lotto points classification jersey he outsprinted Nizzolo and Boom. The final 6km was disrupted by a crash and several riders were left behind. Lotto Belisol wasn’t involved in the crash and the team helped Greipel to the victory with a perfect lead out. In the GC Lars Boom climbs to first.
Today’s 169km long stage started at 12:25 in the rainy village of Essen and immediately four riders broke away from the bunch: Ligthart, Tamouridis, Jacobs and Scheirlinckx. The leaders got a maximum advantage of six minutes. After 100km the peloton started chasing the escapees. After an attack from Ligthart, Scheirlinckx was the first to be dropped off. At 15km from the finish Ligthart suffered from a flat tyre and he was therefore caught by the pack. Tamouridis and Jacobs tried to last but with 10km to go the breakaway was over. A crash relatively in the front of the bunch disrupted the preparations for the bunch sprint and several riders were held back. The pace in the front slowed down a bit so the ones involved in the crash could rejoin the peloton. Lotto Belisol then started a perfect lead out for André Greipel and our German sprinting bomb could finish the hard word of his team mates.
André Greipel: “After yesterday’s stage I was a bit frustrated but now I’m very happy with the victory. We’ve tried three times and now we finally did it. Today we proved with the whole team that we really have a perfect lead out. My team mates prepared the sprint in every detail and it’s thanks to them I won. I felt some pressure to win today because we didn’t succeed in the previous stages. Now that I’ve won a stage in this Eneco Tour I’m of course very happy. At the moment I’m on the second place in the GC, at one second behind Lars Boom, but the GC is not my objective. Tomorrow there’s the time trial and there will be some hard stages this weekend which are not my cup of tea. Because of this victory I can say the Eneco Tour was succesful for me.”
Stage 4 Brief Results:
- Andre Greipel (Germany / Lotto) 3:47:36″
- Giacomo Nizzolo (Italy / RadioShack) ST
- Lars Boom (Netherlands / Belkin)
- Alessandro Petacchi (Italy / Omega Pharma – Quick-Step)
- Alexander Porsev (Russia / Katusha)
- Tyler Farrar (U.S. / Garmin)
- Jens Keukeleire (Belgium / Orica)
- Yauheni Hutarovich (Belarus / AG2R)
- Elia Viviani (Italy / Cannondale)
- Chris Sutton (Australia / Team Sky)
General Classification After Stage 4:
- Lars Boom (Netherlands / Belkin) 16:06:15″
- Andre Greipel (Germany / Lotto) +1″
- Arnaud Demare (France / FDJ.fr) +3″
- Zdenek Stybar (Czech Republic / Omega Pharma – Quick-Step) +6″
- Philippe Gilbert (Belgium / BMC Racing) +7″
- Tyler Farrar (U.S. / Garmin) +9″
- Alessandro Petacchi (Italy / Omega Pharma – Quick-Step) +13″
- Giacomo Nizzolo (Italy / RadioShack) +15″
- Taylor Phinney (U.S. / BMC Racing) +17″
- Pieter Jacobs (Belgium / Topsport Vlaanderen)
Ron Callahan is the chief cook and bottlewasher at Bike World News, doing everything from website design to bike reviews.