Trek went into today's stage of the Tour of Beijing hoping to set Danny Van Poppel up for a sprint win. As he hit the front too early, his brother and lead-out man Boy did the sprint two and so both finished in the top 10.

Although Danny van Poppel recovered from the stomach ailment that knocked him out of contention the first day, he has not fully gained back his power and finished in 7th place for the mass sprint that ended the hilly 176-kilometer stage three. Boy van Poppel finished with him for eighth place.

Boy once again delivered his brother flawlessly to the final corner with 500 meters to go, allowing Danny to begin his sprint in perfect position, but Danny jumped early and was unable to hold his speed to the line. Boy finished alongside Danny, and director Adriano Baffi explained why this happened:

“When Danny passed the long climb we worked for him for the sprint. But Danny passed Boy at 500 meters - he simply started too early.  When Boy saw that it was too early he tried to follow him and help him and that is why at the end they finished together.

"Boy explained to me that after Danny’s sickness - when he turned the last corner with 500 meters to go he hit the wind face on -  at the end he did not have his normal power to keep going.

"He tried to do the best, but in the end it was too long. The last day it’s a bunch sprint for sure and Danny should be 100% recovered."

Tyler Farrar (Garmin Sharp) won the stage, coming from behind in the surprise head-wind finish with a well timed jumped.  With most of the peloton finishing together the General Classification remained unchanged.

Tomorrow the Tour of Beijing tackles the only mountain summit finish of the five-day race, which certainly will sort the final classification ahead of a pancake flat, short circuit race the final day. Trek Factory Racing, as most teams, have patiently kept its climbers in check until the queen stage four, and both Riccardo Zoidl and Julian Arredondo will be ready for the decisive day.

“Again today with Julian and Riccardo we wait, wait, until tomorrow, even though Arredondo did an attack on the last climb," Baffi said. "All day he said he wanted to try, and I kept telling him, ‘tomorrow, tomorrow’.  So he tried on the last climb, and passed first over the top, but okay, at the end it was for nothing.  I think he was feeling good and it is hard to keep him quiet.

"Today we were in the race again, but the results do not show much for our team effort. We tried to do something for Danny, who said he felt good today, and he tried but it did not go as he wanted.  We could not have done anything more than what we did – it was a good team effort – I can say the team has very good morale, good confidence, and are ready for tomorrow.”