After a day for the climbers on Tuesday, the fast-men of the peloton were expected to have their chance going into Valence on Wednesday, with only two category-four climbs throughout the stage. However, it was an intense opening period to the stage with several attacks, but eventually a four-rider move went clear.
With all Team Picnic PostNL riders in the peloton, focus remained on keeping each other safe; guiding Oscar Onley through the day and then coming into the finale with the sprint group as best as possible. When the climbs were over and the rain began to fall, Sean Flynn helped to set the tempo in the peloton to help reel in the breakaway.
Eventually those ahead were caught with five kilometres to go as the bunch snaked its way around several roundabouts. Good positioning work by the team saw last-man Tobias Lund Andresen and Pavel Bittner well to the fore as the peloton headed towards the flamme rouge; trying to avoid the chaos. Unfortunately, a crash saw Bittner go down and hit the deck as they went under the kite, which he quickly signalled on the radio and told Lund Andresen to go for it. Lund Andresen followed those ahead and navigated the final corners brilliantly, before opening up and launching a strong sprint all the way to the line, taking a superb third place at the finish – his first ever Grand Tour podium. A great result for the Team Picnic PostNL Development program graduate.
Lund Andresen expressed: “A third place – I said when we came into the Tour de France that I would be really happy if I came away with a top three. It’s difficult to be fully happy right now though as I got the opportunity because my sprinter, Pavel, crashed. Today I don’t feel like I deserve a top three because there was a crash and it took the other guys out, so it’s a bittersweet feeling. Milan is one of the best sprinters in the world, he is a pure powerhouse, so for a rider like me it is almost impossible to beat him on a sprint like this. On days like this you need a team to support you: every roundabout is really slippery so you need to be in the front positions there to get through without incident, and I think we nailed that today. We nailed all of the key points we wanted to. Unfortunately there was still a crash so far to the front, but I think we did everything to stay out of the chaos.”
Team Picnic PostNL coach Matt Winston added: “The guys did well on a hectic sprint day. They came into position and chose the right lines on the run-in the to the finish. Just before one kilometre to go Pavel was squeezed from both sides and had nowhere to go and ended up crashing. At that moment he was our sprint finisher, but it was some really good and quick communication from Pavel who then spoke into his radio and told Tobi to go for it in the sprint. Tobi then followed the guys ahead and sprinted to a good third place. Everyone feels a little bit disappointed though because with the two of them still together there in the last kilometre we all believe we could have done something really special today; but a third place shows the good teamwork that we have done.”