Former U23 world champion Alexey Lutsenko (Astana) continued his steady progress in the professional ranks by taking a breakthrough victory in the evening time trial of the Tour of Denmark. The Kazakh surprisingly beat Danish specialist Rasmus Quaade (TreFor) by a single second while Manuele Boaro (Tinkoff-Saxo) lost 20 seconds to the stage winner but retained his overall lead.

 

Earlier today Andea Guardini praised Alexey Lutsenko for his great lead-out in the morning stage of the Tour of Denmark and claimed that the former U23 world champion is riding extremely strongly at the moment. This evening he put his good form on show for everyone when he became a surprise winner of the time trial.

 

Having started the stage in 15th overall, Lutsenko was one of the last starters on the mostly flat course in Middelfart and he covered the course in a time of 18.37. That was enough to beat one of the big favouirtes Rasmus Quaade by just a single second while Christopher Juul-Jensen (Tinkoff-Saxo) completed the podium, 7 seconds further adrift.

 

The stage took place on an almost completely flat 15km course in Middelfart and with no technical challenges, the main difficulty was a small climb with 1.5km to go. However, the route was expected to suit the big specialists who could use the long straight roads to their advantage.

 

The first rider down the ramp was Justin Morris (Novo Nordisk) but it was Mads Pedersen (Cult) who set an early best time of 19.08. It came as no surprise, however, that Alex Rasmussen (Riwal) beat his compatriot when he became the first rider to go under the 19-minute mark, posting a time of 18.57.

 

Rasmussen led the race for some time but was beaten into second when Søren Kragh-Andersen (TreFor) lowered the mark by 8 seconds. Ignatas Konovalovas (MTN-Qhubeka) had an even better split time but failed to keep up the speed and crossed the line in a provisional third spot.

 

All eyes were now on Quaade who was one of the big favourites and the Dane posted a time at the intermediate check that was just fractions of a second slower than Konovalovas’. Unlike the Lithuanian, however, he maintained his speed and beat Kragh Andersen by 9 seconds.

 

Michael Valgren (Tinkoff-Saxo) did well by stopping the clock in 18.53 but now the attention had already turned to race leader Manuele Boaro who was expected to be Quaade’s biggest rival. Hence, it came a s a big surprise when Lutsenko powered across the line in a time that was 1 second faster than Quaade’s.

 

Juul Jensen confirmed his progress by slotting into third when it came out that Sean De Bie had set the best split time. Moments later, Boaro passed that point and was only 1 second slowere than the young Belgian.

 

De Bie failed to maintain his speed and at the finish he was 14 seconds behind Lutsenko. This meant that Boaro was the only rider who could realistically challenge the Kazakh and as the Italian could only manage 18.57, Astana took their second win in less than 24 hours.

 

Despite the disappointing performance, Boaro defended his overall lead while Lutsenko moved into second, 10 seconds behind the Italian. Nothing is expected to change in tomorrow’s flat final stage that ends with a few laps on a circuit in Copenhagen where the sprinters are expected to shine.