Ewan’s Tour near-miss
AUSTRALIAN sprinter Caleb Ewan was a frustrated man after being forced to settle for third place in the opening stage of the Tour de France.
Momentarily checked in the sprint, 24-year-old Ewan’s dream of donning the fabled tour yellow jersey after his debut stage was lost as he finished behind the surprise winner, Dutchman Mike Teunissen, and sprint great Peter Sagan.
“I think I definitely had the legs to win and I’m pretty disappointed that I couldn’t use my full sprint today,” Ewan told cyclingnews.com. “I was boxed in. I couldn’t get out in the end. I had to stop pedalling. That’s sprinting. It happens sometimes.”
Teunissen was meant to be helping a teammate take the yellow jersey but ended up slipping it on himself after winning a thrilling bunch sprint after the 194km stage in Brussels on Saturday.
With a crash involving 2018 Tour champion Geraint Thomas causing mayhem 1.7km from the end, Team Jumbo Visna rider Teunissen seized his chance and became the first Dutchman to wear the yellow jersey for 30 years.
“I can’t believe it, we’ve been working for months to bring Dylan (Groenewegen) to the victory and the jersey then it all disappears because he goes down in the crash,” Teunissen, 26, said.
“After that I thought, ‘ I’m still fresh’, and everyone was dying in the last metres, even Sagan, then I took him on the line.
“It’s crazy, I could never imagine myself in the yellow jersey, but no one will ever take it away from me.”
Along with Ewan, Michael Mathews finished sixth to put two Australians in the top 10 in general classification.
Simon Clarke finished 23rd and Mitchelton-Scott’s Michael Hepburn finished 45th to round out the Australian contingent in the top 50. Hepburn’s two teammates with the Australian outfit, brothers Adam and Simon Yates, nished 45th and 146th, respectively.
Thomas went down along with numerous other riders while his Team Ineos co-leader Egan Bernal was held up in the aftermath.
Because the race was inside the last 3km, however, they lost no time and Thomas, whose preparations were hampered by a crash at the Tour de Suisse, was OK.
The same could not be said of Astana’s Jakob Fuglsang, one of the big threats to Thomas, after he crashed 17km from the finish, his glasses cutting his eyebrow and leaving blood trickling down his face.
Initially it looked as though the 34-year-old Dane might lose touch but his teammates helped him recover.
Last night’s stage was a 27.6km team time trial in Brussels, with tonight’s third stage a hilly 215km route from Binche to Épernay.