The third stage of the Tour de Suisse turned into a bitter experience for Team Lampre Merida today.
After a day of intense racing, a succession of escape attempts, and bad weather once again hammering relentlessly on the heads of the riders, the epilogue of Tuesday’s stage came on the final climb of Hasliberg about 20km from the finish.
A flight of 18 riders took command on the run-in to the foot of the final climb, but the advantage of the escapees was cancelled as a consequence of a powerful forcing of the tempo by Roman Kreuziger and his Saxo-Tinkoff teammates. On the slopes of Hasliberg a great selection in the group limited it to about 20 riders. Lampre Merida was represented by Scarponi and a very good Ulissi. At the summit Kreuziger, Frank (BMC), Sagan (Cannondale) and an excellent Scarponi tried to escape from the little group but along the narrow and treacherous final descent Scarponi fell victim to a crash that forced him to give up the dreams of a stage win.
Ulissi reached the finish line with the rest of the group 1'47" after stage winner Peter Sagan, while Scarponi (without sustaining any significant physical consequences) had to give 6'45" at the end of the stage.
"We are really sorry the way the stage developed today,” DS Maini explained afterwards. “The boys had been working to bring Ulissi and Scarponi at the foot of the final climb in good positions. I knew that Michele was in good condition today and determined to do well.
We were hit by misfortune today. Too bad, because even though Sagan was in peak condition today and would have been difficult to beat, the misfortunes we suffered did our hopes for the overall classification no good.”
The day ended on a sour note for Team Lampre Merida as Roberto Ferrari was forced to abandon.
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