Tirreno-Adriatico: Michael Valgren breaks away for first win in five years as Isaac del Toro takes back race lead on stage 5

The peloton tackle a descent early on stage 5 (Image credit: Getty Images)

It was another up-and-down day in Italy with a hilly finishing circuit on the cards. The peloton would tackle 3,800 metres of climbing on the 184km road from Marotta-Mondolfo to Mombaroccio, while four classified climbs filled the route – one ascent of the Monte delle Cesane (7.8km at 6.5) and three of the Monte delle Mattera (6.5km at 5%) on the circuit.

There was a fairly fierce battle to be in the breakaway, but eventually after 30km, a group formed, made up of Edward Planckaert (Alpecin-Premier Tech), Jack Haig (Ineos Grenadiers), Sjoerd Bax (Pinarello-Q36.5), Sean Flynn (Picnic-PostNL), and Joan Bou (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA).

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They quickly got a small gap, but a few stragglers chased to get across, and five soon became eight 10km later as Flynn was dropped, but Valgren, Alaphilippe, Georg Zimmermann (Lotto-Intermarché), and Emiel Verstrynge (Alpecin-Premier Tech) made the junction. With the breakaway formed after 40km, they built up a strong advantage, approaching five minutes at points as Bou claimed the KOM points over the first climb.

Into the final 60km and the trio of final climbs, the pace in the peloton did start to build and the gap fell, as riders like Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers) slipped back on the first ascent. In the peloton, UAE Team Emirates-XRG took on a lot of the pace-setting.

Jack Haig drives the early breakaway (Image credit: Getty Images)

Bou was the first breakaway rider to struggle on the Monte della Mattera as the Alpecin duo pushed the pace. A crash on the descent of the Mattera saw a bit of a split in the bunch, which came back together.

However, things didn’t settle for long as UAE pushed the tempo on even the uncategorised rises to stretch and thin out the bunch in support of Del Toro. This put riders like Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious) in trouble, whilst Matteo Jorgenson was already isolated with 35km to go.

With 30km to go, the leaders – now down to six after losing Sjoerd – held a gap of 2:25 over the reduced group of favourites, which had swelled a bit with riders like Tiberi making it back on and Del Toro, Pellizzari and Jorgenson still all there.

The next climb up to Santuario Beato Sante was immediately costly to the break, with Planckaert dropped almost immediately and the group attacking each other, with Valgren and Alaphilippe going clear. The pair went over the top of the climb with a slender 15-second gap, but the peloton was eating into their advantage.

Onto the final 20km loop, the reduced bunch was 1:50 down on the leaders with UAE still doing much of the work. On the next uncategorised rise, Tiberi was dropped once and for all as the group of favourites shrank further yet.

Michael Valgren and Julian Alaphilippe on the move (Image credit: Getty Images)

Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) kicked off the attacks from the GC favourites with 15km to go, but he couldn’t quite get a group away. In the final 10km, Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe settled into trying to chase down the leaders, and it was touch and go whether there was enough road left to make the catch.

On the final ascent of the Santuario Beato Sante climb, Valgren pretty quickly dispatched Alaphilippe to go solo in the lead, but the GC action also kicked off on the climb, which ate into his advantage.

Del Toro accelerated to draw out a GC group of just eight riders, but Valgren was still 50 seconds clear with 3km to go. The Dane’s teammate Richard Carapaz tried to attack the favourites but didn’t get far.

With just over 2km to go, Del Toro launched a big move which Jorgenson could just about follow, as leader Pellizzari struggled to limit the gap behind. Valgren crested the climb just 20 seconds ahead of Del Toro and Jorgenson, who were now motivated to fight for the stage win as well as GC gains.

However, despite having him in their sights, there was not quite enough road for the pair to catch Valgren, who soloed to victory 11 seconds clear of the chasers, marking his first since a series of setbacks over the last few years.