Matej Mohorič (Bahrain Victorious) has won stage 2 of the Tour de Pologne and is now the new race leader after outdueling João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates) at the tough summit finish of Karpacz.
Mohorič and Almeida finished a few metres ahead of a lead group of around a dozen riders after a late attack by Rafal Majka (UAE Team Emirates) and Lennert van Eetvelt (Lotto-Dstny) had been reeled in.
The long, hilly stage came down to the tough final four-kilometre ascent, with a front group of 30 riders tackling the climb together.
After Majka attacked, Van Eetvelt bridged across, but they were swept up almost within sight of the finish, and Mohorič and Almeida then fought it out for the victory.
“I was super happy about today, the team did an amazing job keeping me in perfect position and out of trouble and I had really good legs on the last climb,” Mohorič said.
“I was tempted to go with Majka, but the team told me to wait until the final part.”
“I was always nervous about that if we had enough, but Damiano [Caruso, teammate] had enough to close the gap a little bit so I could reach across in the last part of the climb.”
“Then when I saw the last few hundred metres, I thought maybe I’d gone too early, but I had enough to go to the line.”
How it unfolded
The longest and most mountainous stage of this year’s Tour de Pologne saw Jacopo Mosca (Lidl-Trek), Lorenzo Milesi (DSM-Firmenich) and Sam Brand (Novo Nordisk) build up a hefty gap of 10 minutes in the first hour before Ineos Grenadiers took control of events behind. The British team then steadily wore down the gap as the race wended its way across the plains south of Leszno, but when the trio reached the foothills of the Carpathian mountains, their advantage had shrunk to well below five minutes.
Brand sat up on the first of the day’s three classified climbs, the category 2 Przelecz pod Srednica, and Milesi began to struggle notably from halfway up. By this point, UAE had added their collective shoulder to the wheel.
Mosca was the first to cross the summit of the climb, but it proved to be a last-ditch effort as with 24 kilometres to go the duo were reeled in. The high pace set by Ineos and UAE had taken its toll though, and then over the second category 2 ascent, the Sosnowka, just 35 riders remained in the front group.
Ineos and UAE worked hard to keep things under control on the fast, flat segment that preceded the final climb, with Geraint Thomas leading the string onto the lower slopes of the Karpacz. But it was Majka who finally burst clear around three kilometres to go, with young Lotto-Dstiny rider Van Eetvelt the fastest to follow.
The Belgian managed to bridge across after a gutsy pursuit, but almost immediately after doing so, Caruso brought up a much bigger group. That in turn allowed Almeida and Mohorič to make their last bid for the line and it briefly looked as if the Portuguese racer, a winner of the Tour de Pologne in 2021, could drop his rival.
However, on the relentlessly steep upper slopes, Mohorič just held off Almeida by the bare minimum to claim both the stage and the lead. Whether the Bahrain Victorious rider will be able to defend himself against Almeida in Thursday’s key time trial remains to be seen, but for now at least, Mohorič has followed up his dramatic Tour de France stage victory with a second win in just over a week.
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