BMC Racing Team's Jempy Drucker infiltrated a late breakaway, helped chase down a potential solo winner, then held off a late charge in the sprint to win Sunday's Prudential RideLondon-Surrey Classic.
Drucker edged out Mike Teunissen (Team LottoNL-Jumbo on the dash to the line on The Mall in London as Ben Swift (Team Sky) took third.
"I am a fast guy, so I was pretty confident," Drucker said after winning his first race of the season. "I looked a bit to Ben Swift because I knew he was a bit nervous. He wanted to do something. I tried to keep his wheel and focus on him."
Earlier, Drucker had worked hard to bring back Teunissen's teammate, Sep Vanmarcke, who attacked with 12 km left in the 200 km race. Vanmarcke had a 20-second lead with five kilometers to go, but was brought back with two kilometers left. Into the final few hundred meters, Drucker stuck to Swift's wheel, then made his move with an attack up the left side. Teunissen followed Drucker and tried to come around him, but the gap was too much to overcome.
The victory was Drucker's first since he won the prologue of the 2010 Flèche du Sud. It was the BMC Racing Team's 22nd win of the season.
The BMC Racing Team was one of the primary aggressors in the second half of the race. First, stagiaire Floris Gerts attacked out of the peloton with 75 kms to go and joined four riders who part of the day's breakaway. About 10 km later, Gerts set off on his own. With 55 km to go, he was joined by six others, but the peloton was close behind approaching the last climb of the day, Box Hill.
Philippe Gilbert, runner-up at Clasica San Sebastian Saturday and winner of a stage of the Tour de Wallonie last week, drove the pace up Box Hill, helped by Tour de France Stage 1 winner Rohan Dennis. Their attack drew out a small group that was reeled in. But not long after that, with 35 km to go, Drucker worked his way into an eight-man breakaway that proved to be the decisive move.
"We needed a hard race and Philippe really wanted to try on Box Hill," BMC Racing Team Sport Director Max Sciandri said. "It kind of broke up, but not enough. I think the pace was always high, but not on the ups and downs. Jempy ended up in a good move and was super strong and rode really smart."
Koya HASHIMOTO 19 years | today |
Katerina NASH 47 years | today |
Ryland SHORT 20 years | today |
Karamoko BAMBA 28 years | today |
Luis SANCHEZ 35 years | today |
© CyclingQuotes.com