After once again destroying the race in the crosswinds, Quick-Step put themselves in prime position to take the stage win, but didn't manage to do so and didn't manage to get someone in the podium aswell.
Maxim Van Gils took the stage win on the queen stage of the Saudi Tour and is set to be the final winner of the race. He took advantage of an attack made in the strong winds of Saudi Arabia by the Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl Team to distance himself from race leader Santiago Buitrago. Whilst the group was mostly made of rouleurs and sprinters, all the attention was on Quick-Step who had Andrea Bagioli as the man to beat for the stage win and Tim Declercq in a potentially strong position to fight for the GC win.
“The crosswinds made it very hard today, but the style of racing suited me, The climb wasn’t to my liking, but the stage until then was something different and I liked going on the offensive with the team as we split the peloton," Declercq said regarding the team plan for today.
“Andrea was strong and gave everything. While he was up the road, I remained in the chasing group and waited to see what would happen. I made a move with 200 meters to go, and even though it’s not the win we wanted, for me this podium is a good result, as I usually don’t have too many chances. I’m happy with my form, confident and ready to continue helping the team in the next races.”
Tim Declercq finished the stage in third place in the chasing group and has risen to 4th on the overall. A very strong performance from "the tractor" who usually is on domestique duties but found some freedom here, which he has every reason to be happy.
As for the team as a whole their possibilities were harmed by Andrea Bagioli's crash on the opening stage. Nevertheless he seemed to recover well, and was close to the win on both occasions but failed to get it, whilst Davide Ballerini has also failed to perform in the flat stages. They have however, one more day to try and make up for the relative lack of results in the Middle East.
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- Your not looking back far then, the US won one last year and Belgium the year before, they being more likely to repeat than the US. Besides with only 3 per year and Slovenia/Denmark already named that only leaves one country per year so yes obviously that means every year about 200 can’t hope for a GT ;-) On the other hand, it is rare to see so many different countries/ riders winning Giro or TdF over a long period as was the case before the SloDen rivalry heated upMistermaumau26-11-2024
- And now Remco is at that tooMistermaumau26-11-2024
- C’mon, give the guy a break, after all that he only lost to an alien by a few minutes over 80 hours and easily beat everyone else. Without the alien’s improvement over last year he’d probably have even won it. Nobody last year expected alien to still make such a big jump.Mistermaumau26-11-2024
- I understand. But once you join the TdF peloton you don't get to use excuses from before the race. Now if he had crashed in the race that's another story.Sweep26-11-2024
- Bernard would be getting dropped while Pogi still had domestiques helping him.Veganpotter26-11-2024
- Being recovered isn't the same as being where you would have been without losing all that preparationVeganpotter26-11-2024
- They are riding the same roads in the same weather as they have for the 100 years. The only things that have changed are the speeds and the tactics. Neither of which are decided by the UCI. All you have to do is listen to the DS of every team in every race telling every rider to move up and ride faster.Sweep26-11-2024
- If you crash then you say you've recovered then you decide to ride then you say you can win and then you lose. Well, Jonas you can't say "But I crashed".Sweep26-11-2024
- He will be back strong in '25 barring another crazy crash.awp26-11-2024
- Chad Gerlach, the homeless heroin addict? Or a different Chad Gerlach? Good luck with your own demons, Sweep.
MarkFour26-11-2024