Everyone expected that the final climb would be decisive on stage 3 of the Santos Tour Down Under. A new climb for the race, Knotts Hill peaked just over 5 km from the finish and was steep enough that it seem to be the perfect launchpad. In the end, the winning move would come just after that climb.
There’d been a series of attacks on the way up – Michał Kwiatkowski (Ineos Grenadiers), Luke Plapp (Jayco AlUla), Afonso Eulalio (Bahrain Victorious), and Remy Rochas (Groupama-FDJ) were the most active, thinning the group to less than 20 by the top. But no one had gotten away.
So when Javier Romo (Movistar) put in a dig with around 5 km to go, it seemed like just another attack that was destined to be reeled in ahead of a reduced-bunch sprint. But on the rolling terrain towards the finish in Uraidla, the 26-year-old Spaniard managed to maintain a narrow advantage. Chris Harper (Jayco AlUla) tried bridging across, as did last year’s Willunga winner Oscar Onley (Picnic PostNL). Lidl-Trek, too, with the biggest numbers of any team in the chase – with five of 18 – put in a concerted effort through Bauke Mollema.
But the damage was done. Romo held on to take a gutsy stage win by five seconds, as last year’s overall runner-up Jhonatan Narváez (UAE Team Emirates) and Finn Fisher-Black (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) collected the minor placings (and perhaps crucially, some bonus seconds).
Romo’s stage win sees the former triathlete take the overall lead on a lumpy day where overnight leader Sam Welsford (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) found himself distanced, eventually losing more than 12 minutes.
While Romo mightn’t have been many people’s pick for the stage win, the victory was far from a fluke. In fact, attacking where he did was exactly what he and his Movistar team had planned for.
“We knew Romo was going good and nobody expected it, I think, but that was actually a bit of the goal,” Movistar sports director Jürgen Roelandts told Escape. “When you’re a bit unexpected, it’s better. This morning, I told him, watch out, definitely, just after the climb, and that’s where he went.
“All the team went in for him. And I think he did it in an amazing way, also, with all the downhills and the little hills [in the last 5 km]. To stay in front of a group of 18 guys, I think you have to have a lot of class for this.”
Romo told reporters after the stage that he didn’t have his earpiece in in the final kilometres; that his race radio wasn’t working. But he didn’t really need it – once he was away, the plan was simple: just stay away.
“I’m very happy,” said the softly spoken Spaniard. “This morning I can’t imagine this day. I worked from September for this race, my team had a lot of confidence in me and today all the team worked very well to help me, because the position today was so important. And in the final, I had very good legs. I tried. Was always perfect.”
The win is Romo’s first ever as a professional and comes in what is his fifth season in the WorldTour ranks.
Stage 3 of the Tour Down Under had been billed as a major GC day, with Luke Plapp telling Escape that it was the hardest stage of the race. The peloton had two ascents of the new Knotts Hill climb to tackle and while they served to thin out the field, the stage perhaps wasn’t as decisive as some had predicted.
“The first lap – it was maybe not as selective as I thought it could have been,” said Jayco AlUla sports director Mat Hayman. “But then second lap … we had Chris [Harper] and Luke [Plapp] up there, and we still tried to be aggressive until the end, because we know it’s hard, especially with fast guys – climbers that can sprint.”
One of those “climbers that can sprint” is the Ecuadorian Narváez. He was second overall last year and sits in the same place on GC after three stages of this year’s race, eight seconds from the overall lead. Indeed, most of the GC contenders are among the 18 riders who finished today’s stage within 15 seconds of the overall lead. Fisher-Black, Jay Vine (UAE Team Emirates), Onley, Thomas Gloag (Jumbo-Visma), Plapp, and Harper are all within that cluster of riders. Also in the mix is 18-year-old super-talent Albert Withen Philipsen (Lidl-Trek) who sits seventh overall in his very first WorldTour race.
The most obvious loser on the day was the defending champion Stevie Williams (Israel-Premier Tech) who crashed with 60 km to go and was seen walking around with a nasty limp before getting back on his bike. He finished the day 20 seconds behind his GC rivals and 25 seconds behind Romo.
“It was a bit of a shit-fight all day and I came down in a crash just before the [first Knotts Hill] climb,” a dejected Williams said. “It was just a touch of wheels at the front and then I came down. Then I tried to recompose and come back, and I was alright. And then, yeah, I just didn’t have the minerals on the climb and fell behind.”
Williams has been cleared of any serious injuries but his chances of winning a second straight TDU are all but gone now.
“So yeah, not ideal, but so is life,” the Welshman said. “And yeah, we have three more days to try and be good. Hopefully we can jump back from this as a team and carry on with the rest of the race.”
So what of Romo’s chances in the GC, now that he leads the race by eight seconds? With two expected sprint days (stages 4 and 6) and Willunga Hill (stage 5) remaining, can Romo turn today’s daring raid into overall victory? Roelandts says that’s definitely the plan.
“I think we try to,” the Belgian former pro said. “We see day by day. It’s also a climb that suits him, Willunga. But we start with Victor Harbor.”
Victor Harbor is the destination on tomorrow’s stage 4, a day that should finish in a bunch sprint. But that’s no certainty. The last time the race came here, Rohan Dennis won the day with a late solo move from an elite lead group that formed over the steep climb of Nettle Hill, 20 km from the finish. The same finale will be used in tomorrow’s stage.
With three stages remaining in the Tour Down Under, just about anything could still happen.
Loading...
Loading...
Did we do a good job with this story?