Stage 3 of the Tour of Normandie will probably be the most straight forward of the stage race. The course was a mainly flat affair that saw high winds on the way to Argentan featured.
Breakaways tried to go throughout the day with varying success.
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Nathan Van Hooydonck got away for about 20 kilometers early on before being brought back photo: tourdenormandiecycliste.fr |
Another group tried following the only real difficulty on the course but it wasn't until 110 kilometers gone that a breakaway was able to make an impact.
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Tom Scully (Madison-Genesis) got into a move to try and get some time on his rivals photo: tourdenormandiecycliste.fr |
The group included Lennard Hofstede and Mitchell Cornelisse (Rabobank Development), Fabien Canal (Armee de Terre), Alex Peters (SEG Racing), Jeremy Cornu (Vendée U), Scully, Paulius Siskevicius (AnPost-Chain Reaction), Vegard Stake Laengen (Joker), Joachim Van Reyten (Lotto-Belisol U23), Jetse Bol and Ronan Van Zandbeek (both Join's-De Rijke).
The group was able to shake things up a bit but heading into the final city circuits the breakaway was hunted down and only made it through one circuit out of three before a reduced peloton caught up to them. The team that really made it well through the wind and splits was Joker, who had 5 riders in the front group, took to the front to keep the pace up and neutralize any attacks.
A tight sprint taken out by Hoelgaard (r) ahead of Vermeltfoort and Kruopis (c) photo: tourdenormandiecycliste.fr |
Dimitri Claeys held onto the overall lead while Hoelgaard vaulted to 2nd overall just 6 seconds down while former leader Tom Bohli, Tom Scully and Nathan Van Hooydonck fill out the rest of the top 5 and are all within 15 seconds.
The race continues into Bagnoles-de-l'Orne with a course that has a very undulating profile and could be very rewarding for a well-timed attacker.
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