{"id":542530,"date":"2026-03-15T19:26:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-15T19:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/542530\/"},"modified":"2026-03-15T19:26:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-15T19:26:10","slug":"a-lot-of-guys-were-dive-bombing-each-other","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/542530\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cA lot of guys were dive-bombing each other\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nThe INEOS Grenadiers<\/a> rider admitted the situation was dangerously close for those fighting for position at the head of the peloton. \u201cIt was really close to me, and thankfully I\u2019m alright,\u201d he added. \u201cHopefully, all the guys who went down are okay because you never want to see that on the last day of the race.\u201dBrutal climbing pace nearly derailed the sprinters<\/p>\n

Even before the crash chaos of the finale, the final stage had already proven far from straightforward for the fast men.<\/p>\n

On the climb of Ripatransone, the pace of the peloton exploded when Mathieu van der Poel pushed the tempo at the front, forcing many sprinters to fight simply to remain in contention. \u201cThe climb was so hard,\u201d Welsford explained. \u201cThey just rode incredibly fast to try and drop the sprinters.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite the intensity of the effort, the Australian said he felt surprisingly strong as the race split under the pressure. \u201cI actually felt really good on the climb, and I had the guys around me helping,\u201d he said. \u201cEvery time I looked down, I was doing over 500 watts, and we still weren\u2019t catching them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The effort from his teammates proved crucial in keeping him in the race as the stage returned to the flat roads along the Adriatic coast. \u201cThe boys did a fantastic job pacing me and looking after me to get me over the climb,\u201d Welsford said. \u201cThen, in the circuits, we had to chase pretty hard to close the split. I think Van der Poel was pulling that almost by himself, which made it quite hard for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Sam<\/p>\n

Sam Welsford celebrates victory on stage 3 of the 2026 Tour Down Under<\/p>\n

Close to victory but left wanting more<\/p>\n

Once the race regrouped and the expected bunch sprint materialised, Welsford found himself in a strong position in the final metres as the peloton thundered towards the finish line along the seafront in San Benedetto del Tronto.<\/p>\n

But despite the work of his teammates throughout the stage, Milan proved the fastest in the chaotic run to the line. \u201cThat was a crazy finish,\u201d Welsford reflected. \u201cThe boys did an amazing job for me today, and I felt really good. I\u2019m a bit disappointed with second because you always want to be on the top step.\u201d<\/p>\n

Even so, the result left the Australian optimistic about what lies ahead as the season moves deeper into the spring. \u201cI\u2019m happy with the result, but you always want more,\u201d he concluded.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The INEOS Grenadiers rider admitted the situation was dangerously close for those fighting for position at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":542531,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,66980,177165,85,179189],"class_list":["post-542530","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-ineos-grenadiers","tag-sam-welsford","tag-sports","tag-tirreno-adriatico"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=542530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/542530\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/542531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=542530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=542530"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=542530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}