“Hindsight is a wonderful thing" - No regrets for Stephen Williams after late Tour of Britain attack backfires

Stephen Williams was hoping to take overall victory at the Tour of Britain in his homeland of Wales on Sunday, but despite a late attack looking promising, it wasn't to be.

“It was a tough day. Obviously it went flat out up Bryn Du as everyone I think knew that it would," Williams told Cycling Weekly post-race. The Welshman was gifted the award of most combative rider on the stage for his late attack alongside INEOS Grenadiers' Carlos Rodriguez. "I made a decision and then I tossed a coin on whether to be aggressive and go with Carlos and that's what I did."

Once the Spaniard kicked again though, Williams had no answer and was dropped. Nevertheless, Williams doesn't regret his decision. “Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Perhaps I should have stayed in the bigger group and conserved my energy for the finishing circuit but that's how it goes,” he analyses. “I'm proud of my ride and I think it's better on a circuit like that to be on the front foot and as we then saw, Carlos stayed away. So in the end, it was my legs that let me down but that's how it goes.”

Rodriguez went on to win the stage, but wasn't able to get enough advantage to prevail in the general classification as well with Wout van Aert holding on for overall “My ride was still good though,” Williams concludes. “It gave me a lot of confidence in myself and I'm happy with how it went. I just obviously, you know, am still disappointed. I didn't really come to get dropped in the final circuit but yeah, that’s how it goes.”