"I didn't go in the breakaway to show myself - I went to win."

Those were the words of Astana's Valerio Agnoli after stage seven at the Tour of Turkey. Agnoli and two other riders attacked the peloton at the start of the stage to try and take maximum advantage of opportunities on the final hills of the 2015 Tour of Turkey, building an advantage of nearly seven minutes over more than 100km.

Teammates Bakhtiyar Kozhatayev and Ruslan Tleubayev sat in the chasing peloton to conserve energy, and took over when Agnoli and his fellow breakaway riders were caught just before ths finish in Izmir. Kozhatayev finished tenth in the final sprint, in the same time as stage winner Mark Cavendish of Great Britain -

Astana Pro Team riders and all of the peloton boarded airplanes after the stage to fly to Istanbul for the final stage on Sunday.