Whilst no ‘mountain stage’, today's stage five of the Tour de Pologne was far from a walk in the park as the second consecutive 200km+ day of racing and featuring a number of pinching climbs.

It proved costly for some, who now look to be out of the general classification race having missed crucial splits in the second half of racing.

After an early break was closed down, the first critical split in the peloton occurred with 40km to go. Former Italian champion Ivan Santaromita and Giro d’Italia pink jersey wearer Simon Clarke represented ORICA-GreenEDGE in that move.

A series of attacks in the last 20km saw the pair lose contact, Santaromita riding on to finish as the team’s top performer in 19th position. Meanwhile ahead, Bart de Clercq (Lotto-Soudal) timed his solo move inside the last five kilometres to claim the stage and move into the race lead.

“We came here to target the first four stages and the guys certainly haven’t been twiddling their thumbs,” sport director Matt Wilson said. “They have worked extremely hard and that was always going to take its toll.

“We have Santaromita here to have a go for these two days but he just couldn’t quite stay with the leaders over the second last climb there.

“It actually broke up more than we probably anticipated today, it was an a lot harder than I thought it would be.”