The peloton made the 194.6km journey from Ambri to the Malbun ski resort in Liechtenstein today, with two brutal climbs again awaiting the riders. The peloton kept a large breakaway on a long leash until halfway through the race before the gap slowly began to narrow. In the end, however, the last of the escapees weren’t able to be reeled back in and Pinot took the day’s win. Behind followed a smaller GC group containing Sergio Higuita, Felix Großschartner and Maximilian Schachmann. As the group became smaller, with about 3km remaining, Sergio launched an attack and was able to drop Thomas and the then-overall leader Fuglsang. The Colombian champion thereby took over the yellow jersey and retained his lead in the young rider’s classification.
Result
01 T. Pinot 5:06:38
02 O. Rodriguez +0:25
03 A. Lutsenko +0:38
04 S. Higuita +1:19
From the Finish Line
“We knew that the last part of the climb was particularly steep after a short flat section and so our plan was to attack with Felix and then with Max. Felix, however, didn’t feel so good in the finale. After Fuglsang went and Thomas followed him, I launched my attack. I knew that I am not a time trial specialist, so I had to get valuable seconds here before tomorrow’s stage. It will be hard to compete with Thomas, who is a time trial specialist, but we will give it our all again tomorrow and do our best.” – Sergio Higuita
“We were surprised this morning by a positive Covid result from Marco Haller, our important helper. So we had to send our three riders, who were all very well placed in the overall classification, without a helper into the race. We then were fully focused on the last climb. Our plan was for Sergio to attack on a steep part, which he did well. It’s great that this turned out as planned and that he took the leader’s jersey after we already had it once with Aleks Vlasov. Max and Felix also did their part to make sure that the yellow jersey is now on our shoulders. Now, of course, it will be hard in tomorrow’s time trial. Our goal is to get a podium finish in the time trial and maybe we can also win the team classification and keep the best young rider jersey with Sergio.” – Jens Zemke, Sports Director
