SPRINTERS' PARADISE
There were bunch inishes galore at the Tour of Britain, as Lars Boom took his second overall win
The day the Tour of Britain kicked off in Edinburgh under grey clouds and in strong gusts of wind, the Vuelta a España was sweltering in sticky 31-degree heat in southern Spain. And that wasn’t the only contrast between the two races.
While the Vuelta peloton was slogging up nine summit finishes, the Tour of Britain’s organisers designed a route that featured six flat road stages out of a total of eight, plus a flat time trial and a rolling stage. This had the effect of enticing all the sprinters who wanted to give Spain a wide berth. The plan worked, with Mark Cavendish, Elia Viviani, Alexander Kristoff, Caleb Ewan, Dylan Groenewegen and Fernando Gaviria all on the start line. The headline sprinters shared the spoils from six bunch finishes, although Ewan came out on top by securing three wins to take his total for the season so far to 10. Viviani continued his impressive end-of-summer form by scoring his fifth win in three weeks on stage 2 into Blyth, after Edvald Boasson Hagen was disqualified. Viviani’s future Quick-Step teammate Gaviria won stage 4, while Groenewegen took the win on stage 6.
The Tour of Britain, like the Tour de Yorkshire, has gained a justifiable reputation for tough racing. Grippy roads and uncategorised climbs aplenty usually make the parcours trickier than it appears in the road book. It’s often a war of attrition, with at least one stand-out, classic British climb to really challenge the riders. The 2017 route, however, was the first in the last five editions not to feature a summit finish, and instead the only stage to shake up the general classification was the time trial in Clacton, Essex.
Dutchman Lars Boom surprised the TT specialists, including Tony Martin and Vasil Kiryienka, by taking the stage win on the 16km course, and the race lead. Despite a late charge by Boasson Hagen on the final day into Cardiff, the Norwegian jumping clear of the peloton to cross the line solo and pick up some valuable bonus seconds, Boom held on to repeat his 2011 GC win.
While organisers may have attracted the top sprinters, the race didn’t quite manage to ignite – seven of the top 10 in the time trial went on to finish in the top 10 overall, such was the lack of movement in the general classification. And though the wind and rain didn’t dampen the spirits of the many fans on the roadside, in shirking the type of racing the Tour of Britain knows best, the race lost some of its excitement.