Alexander Kristoff took his best ever result in a Paris-Nice stage when he sprinted to fourth in today's second stage. However, the plan for Katusha had been to set up Alexey Tsatevich for the sprint but a crash derailed those plans.

Katusha Team’s Alexander Kristoff put himself in a solid sprint position today for Paris-Nice’s stage two starting in Rambouillet and ending in Saint-Georges-sue-Baulche after 205 km of racing.

Kristoff came up the right-hand side of the course and captured fourth place, a strong result that moved him into 7th overall on the general classification.

"This is my best result at the stages of Paris – Nice," Kristoff said. "So from my viewpoint, I can be satisfied with today’s 4th place. Of course, I would like to win today, because I feel really good now.

"We had a good opportunity to win a stage, but not everything went as we hoped. But tomorrow we will have another stage and we will try again. What a pity, Alexey Tsatevich crashed on the final corner. Under normal circumstances in the final sprint he could start from my wheel and could fight for the victory for our team. The main thing is Alexey did not suffer any serious injures and can continue the race."

Tsatevich was in a good position in the last kilometres and stayed safe among the leaders. But entering the final corner he crashed on the right side. Alexey was lucky and did not get any serious traumas or injures and was able to continue the race and to finish.

"I am sorry for Alexey because of his crash inside the final kilometre," sports director Dmitry Konyshev said. "We had a plan for today’s stage – Alexey had to protect Alexander Kristoff in the finish sprint and in a good moment he could sprint for himself from Kristoff’s wheel because the stage suited him.  He crashed and the plan did not work.

"On the other side, Alexander made a really strong sprint and took a good 4th place. Of course, this is only the beginning and Katusha Team will continue to fight in the next stages."

You can read our stage preview here and follow our live coverage at 14.25 CET on CyclingQuotes.com/live.