Thibau Nys (Lidl-Trek) delivered yet another exhibition of his finishing power with a fine victory on stage 1 of the Tour de Pologne in Karpacz. The Belgian timed his effort perfectly on the sharp uphill finale, ripping clear with 200 metres to go before catching and passing late attacker Wilco Kelderman (Visma-Lease a Bike).
Kelderman held on for second place ahead of Lukas Nerurkar (EF Education-EasyPost), three seconds down on Nys, while Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) signalled his intentions for the week by coming home in fourth place at six seconds ahead of defending champion Matej Mohoric (Bahrain Victorious) and Diego Ulissi (UAE Team Emirates).
Visma-Lease a Bike took command at the head of the bunch on the final haul towards the finish, with Vingegaard well placed, but it was Jan Christen (UAE Team Emirates) who went on the offensive, punching clear with 2km remaining.
Kelderman immediately followed, but the Dutchman ignored Christen’s entreaties to come through and take a turn on the front. Undeterred, Christen pressed on and then attacked twice more with intent inside the final kilometre, but Kelderman resisted on each occasion.
Behind, an impressive Archie Ryan (EF Education-EasyPost) was leading the pursuit on behalf of Nerurkar, but just as the chasers were about to make contact, Kelderman launched a searing acceleration of his own.
At that point, with 400m to go, Kelderman looked every inch a stage winner, but Nys was keenly aware of his aptitude for a finale like this. The Belgian bided his time until the final 200m before lifting himself from the saddle and launching a rasping acceleration.
After ripping clear of the chasing group, Nys proceeded to blast past Kelderman. Despite the steep ramps in the final 50m, he kept his gear turning over to take the stage by three seconds and move into the yellow jersey of race leader.
"I've won a stage in all the stage races I've been to so far which is something I could only dream of before the start of the season. It's better than I thought. Wearing the leader's jersey is unbelievable. It feels great,“ Nys said.
Kelderman did enough to hold on for second place ahead of Nerurkar, while Vingegaard led a group that included Mohoric, Ulissi, Roman Gregoire (Groupama-FDJ) and Jakob Fulgsang over the line a further six seconds back.
The opening leg of the Tour de Pologne featured the long, shallow climb of Przełęcz Kowarska in the finale ahead of a two-part kick towards the finish in Karpacz that lent itself to puncheurs.
The day was animated by a four-man move featuring Jan Maas (Jayco-Alula), Michał Paluta (Poland), Norbert Banaszek (Poland) and Szymon Sajnok (Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team), though the quartet wasn’t granted a huge degree of leeway by the peloton given the relative brevity of the stage.
Maas and Paluta were the last men standing from the break, with the latter leading over the top of the category 2 Przełęcz Kowarska. By then, the pair had a lead of less than a minute over the peloton, and they would be swept up on the two-part drag towards the finish, with Visma-Lease a Bike, Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe and Ineos all prominent at the head of the peloton.
The terrain on the run-in unsurprisingly proved too much for men like Caleb Ewan (Jayco-Alula), and it also tempted Pepijn Reinderink (Soudal-QuickStep) onto the attack with 5km to go.
Reinderink’s acceleration was a wholehearted one, but he would be brought to heel with a shade under 3km to go, shortly after a crash in the peloton had seen Romain Bardet (DSM-Firmenich-PostNL) among the fallers.
Vingegaard was well placed on the final climb to the line in Karpacz, but it was his teammate Kelderman who sprang into action to track Christen’s move.
Ultimately, however, the day would belong to Nys, who picked up his seventh victory of a very successful sophomore season in the WorldTour. The 21-year-old had already collected victories of high calibre on similar terrain at the Tour de Romandie and Tour de Suisse, as well as overall victory at the Tour of Hungary.
Thanks to the stage winner’s time bonus, Nys carries an overall lead of seven seconds on Kelderman into Tuesday’s 15.4km from Mysłakowice to Karpacz. Nerurkar lies third at nine seconds, while Vingegaard will begin the day 16 seconds off the pace in fourth.
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