After his second place on stage three, Luka Mezgec is back on the podium on today’s fourth stage but not on the different step that both he and the team were hoping for. At the end of a long and very fast finishing straight Luka sprinted to third place after a long lead-out from teammate Nikias Arndt.

The fourth stage was the last sprint opportunity of the race and Team Giant-Shimano together with the other sprinters teams were not to be denied this final opportunity. The race was all back together in the final three kilometres and the team negotiated another technical finish to launch the sprint from the front. Luka Mezgec got a bit caught behind a wall of riders and only had a small window of opportunity to launch his effort, and in the end he just ran out of room before the line.

Inside of 10km to go the race was all back together and despite a few strong late solo attacks the peloton remained grouped until the final kick to the line. Tobias Ludvigsson was one of those to clip off the front but on more of a policing duty than as a full blown attack.

It was once again a frantic and technical finish with the team struggling to stick together but Nikias Arndt and Luka Mezgec managed to find each other before Nikias Arndt launched the lead-out for Luka Mezgec. The road descended slightly to the line seeing riders running out of gears in the sprint. Luka Mezgecc got stuck behind a wall of riders and could not find a gap until too late, running out of ground as he wound up his sprint, eventually taking third position.

Tomorrow sees the first mountain finish of the race and will be a chance for the likes of Warren Barguil and Georg Preidler to test their legs in the hills, and for Georg Preidler to start his bid for a strong position overall.

Luka Mezgec described the finishing sprint after the stage to the Giant-Shimano website:

“It was pretty hectic again but it went pretty well. We moved up together before the final kilometres before Nikias came past me to launch the sprint. I wanted to jump onto his wheel but couldn’t as it was so fast and someone else already was there.”

“I then got blocked in at the end and couldn’t launch my sprint until 60m to go. On a finish like today a lot depends on luck with positioning at the finish. I was shouting at Nikias at the end for him to open the gap but it was so fast he couldn’t hear me,” he finished

Team coach in Poland Addy Engels added to Mezgec’s statement:

“The plan today was very similar to yesterday, to let a small break go and then to join the chase in the second half of the stage. I thought that lots of attacks would come after the initial break was brought back but three riders went away and it was well controlled,” he said.

“Thierry [Hupond] joined the chase again and did a good job before the others took over in the final stages. It was the last sprint opportunity and tomorrow will be a very different race in the hills, and hopefully the team can perform well again in this terrain.”