Nine laps on a 27 kilometer long circuit around Plouay in the French one-day race, GP Ouest France where Team Saxo-Tinkoff were on the start line with Alberto Contador, Daniele Bennati, Matti Breschel, Mads Christensen, Manuele Boaro, Karsten Kroon, Christopher Juul-Jensen and Sergio Paulinho.
Four riders stole the limelight in front of the chasing field the most of the day but on the penultimate lap of the race, a series of attacks was launched from the peloton and with 32 kilometers to go, the escapees were neutralized. And the attacks continued on the final lap stretching the peloton to one long line of riders.
On the final climb, Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) escaped and soloed towards to the finish line. But he was caught by the sprinters and Filippo Pozzatto (Lampre) was the fastest on the line and took the win.
Team Saxo-Tinkoff’s Daniele Bennati finished fifth.
“Our plan was to keep the peloton in one piece for a bunch sprint decision. We knew the climbs on the course and we didn’t expect them to be too hard to handle for the sprinters so the entire team worked for Matti and Daniele. And Daniele was in a great position on the final hundred meters but as they rocketed past from behind, he was shut in and had to settle with fifth place. Of course, that’s a bit disappointing when you were eyeing the win but finishing as good result after all even though we went for the victory,” said Saxo-Tinkoff DS, Philippe Mauduit.