After reaching the podium in yesterday’s stage, Fabio Silvestre had another opportunity in the much longer stage two Wednesday and sprinted to a respectable seventh place.

The 188-kilometer stage was won by Andrea Palini (Skydive Dubai), who is proving to be the sprinter to beat as he snagged his second straight victory and easily held onto the leader’s jersey. Sacha Modolo (Lampre-Merida) finished second and Ruslan Tleubayev (Astana) rounded out the podium.

“It was the plan to look for a breakaway today if there was a group of 10 riders or more,” explained director Adriano Baffi. “Szymon Rekita tried again in the early part but the good breakaway ended up being seven riders and we had no one there. But in a stage like today the breakaway has little chance unless it’s a good sized group, so then we focused on the sprint for Fabio. He was seventh and he’s disappointed to not finish higher. The boys helped him the best they could but we don’t have a leadout team here to help him more in the finale.”

In a straightforward sprint stage, it was not an easy day for Trek Factory Racing as they battled sickness and a late crash but fortunately came through with all six riders finishing and able to take the start tomorrow.

“There was a big crash with three kilometers to go and Julien [Bernard] and Leonardo [Basso] were involved, but they are okay,” continued Baffi. “Hayden [Roulston] also had some intestinal issues during the race but he was able to finish. The crash happened within 3kms, so all the riders finished on the same time. Tomorrow we try again.”