‘I went farming today’ – Juan Ayuso avoids Paris-Nice stage 2 crashes by riding into field

Two days into his debut edition of Paris-Nice, Juan Ayuso’s GC bid remains firmly on course, with the young Spanish star both managing to skirt one of the series of crashes that have affected this year’s edition of the race and pick up some bonus seconds on stage 2.

After the day’s racing, Ayuso explained to reporters, including Danish TV channel TV2, that he had been caught out by a crash. However, his good humour when discussing it indicated that while such events are never pleasant, he had at least done the right thing to stay out of trouble.

Equally, Ayuso’s snatching some bonus seconds helped push the Lidl-Trek leader into a top position on the GC, which can only be of use when it comes to the starting order of the first setpiece battle for the overall on Tuesday, a 23.3km team time trial.

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“I went farming today, I avoided a crash by going into the grass, so I managed to save that one,” Ayuso said after stage 2 in a joking reference to his brief off-road incursion into the fields of northern France.

During the stage, too, he managed to pick up four seconds in the day’s one bonus sprint at km 140 in the town of Fromont, behind sprinter Vito Braet (Lotto-Intermarché) but ahead of race leader, American fastman Luke Lamperti (EF Education-EasyPost).

“I thought the break was probably going to be there, but when the seconds were up for grabs, the team positioned me perfectly, all I had to do was the last 100 metres,” he explained.

“I nearly got six [seconds, for first place] so it was a close one. But I’m happy with it.”

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Thanks to his mid-race sprint, Ayuso has gained 20 spots on GC and is now running sixth overall, which means that in Tuesday’s TTT, he will start ahead of the majority of his rivals, including Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike).

“Better to be in front than behind, of course,” Ayuso responded when told that Vingegaard reportedly had said that Paris-Nice would not be won by four seconds.

“Tomorrow [Tuesday] is a big day with the team, and we’ll see how we finish tomorrow. Four seconds is quite a lot.”