Lawson Craddock did a great Tour of Poland. The Giant-Alpecin rider finished 17th overall. But he showed he has a great shape during the queen stage. He crossed the finish line 3rd, 8 seconds behind Colombian Sergio Henao.

"Yesterday [Thursday] was tough. I haven’t raced since Dauphiné and now it’s a month and a half, two months on. I did a lot of training before Poland but didn’t quite have the race fitness, so I knew a 223-kilometre stage, especially with how hard the parcours was, was going to be difficult. It’s been a while since I cramped, and I think just not having the race fitness was a big factor,” Craddock told Cyclingnews. « But I fought through in the end and was able to recover today. I had a lot of help from my team, they fought as long as they could, put me in a good position. I’m just really happy to bounce back and be able to make up for it. In this sport you have to have a short memory so I put yesterday in the past and focused on today and I’m just really glad it worked out."

With this performance, he hopes to be present at the Vuelta a Espana. "Hopefully I’ll be lining up at the Vuelta – it’s been my big season goal since dropping out of it last year. It seems like I’m on a good wave for it. I imagine it’ll be a little different [to Poland]. The other guys that are here will be fighting it out for the overall win, whereas maybe I’ll just be targeting a couple of stages. Today was definitely a big confidence boost anyway."