Vink rides off with elusive tour crown

After nine attempts, and after being jilted twice at the altar, Michael Vink is finally a Tour of Southland champion.

It was third time lucky for the lanky Cantabrian after finishing runner-up in both 2016 and 2017, Vink clinging onto a 16 second lead during the final, frantic 77km stage from Winton to Invercargill on Saturday.

‘‘I’m pinching myself. I’ve been close so many times and to finally finish it off in the way we did – defending the yellow jersey for three days,’’ Vink said. ‘‘We lost a guy after Bluff, which was unfortunate, so for five guys to defend it against such a quality field was fantastic.’’

Hamish Bond finished second overall, trailing by 16secs, with Sam Gaze third at 2min 59sec, while defending champion James Piccoli had to settle for fourth at

3min 22sec.

It was anything but a procession on the final day, with Vink seeing an overnight lead of

1min 32sec decimated by a fantastic individual time trial by Bond in Winton.

Like Bond, Vink is a national time trial champion, and a fourtime Winton time trial winner, but he could do nothing to stop Bond from putting himself in a position to win the race.

‘‘To be honest, a gap was a gap. All I had to do was follow Hamish’s wheel and if he had’ve gotten away he would have won the tour,’’ Vink said.

‘‘I thought I had a really good time trial but Hamish was next level and full credit to him.’’

The final stage into Invercargill was taken out by Dylan Kennett, who had been challenging for a stage win all week.