Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) took the home win that most had expected him to take yesterday when the Norwegian powered clear to narrowly edge out Robert Wagner (Belkin) and Jetse Bol (Belkin) in the bunch sprint on the second stage of the Tour de Fjords.

Having done a huge work to defend the leader's jersey of teammate Sergey Chernetskiy, the Norwegian had kept enough in reserve to win the sprint and will have to go all out again later today in the crucial team time trial where Chernetskiy's lead will come under pressure.

“Today I felt better than yesterday,” said Kristoff, “even if I'm still not in my top shape. In the last climb I suffered a lot, but afterwards I was able to come back and take part in the final sprint: I'm happy, this victory is very important for me because it came at home, in front of my fans. The stage was very hard: our rivals attacked a lot and tried to change the situation in the general classification. I think the team did a great job to help Sergey, and I'm glad that Katusha managed to keep the leader's jersey too”.