Boaro wins queen stage of Circuit Sarthe

Italy's Manuele Boaro delivered Tinkoff-Saxo's third victory of the year as he claimed the queen stage of the Circuit de la Sarthe-Pays de la Loire atop the Mont des Avaloirs. By a margin of three seconds only, he took over the lead from his compatriot Adriano Malori (Movistar) who defended himself brilliantly.

With one day to go, Boaro's victory echoed Oleg Tinkov's controversial post on Facebook. Last week the Russian tycoon wrote: "We definitely need to reduce the number of races - no one is interested in these provincial races that get no TV coverage."

However, the Venetian was so delighted to win that he yelled out loud as he crossed the finishing line ahead of Pierre Rolland of Europcar.

"I was determined to win today because my team had done such a great job to bring me in a good position in the finale," Boaro told Cyclingnews in Pré-en-Pail.

"Every time that I come to this race, I want to do well. Three years ago, I finished second overall and in the time trial as well, but this time, the race was much harder with this fourth stage finish at the top of the climb. I still have to defend the jersey for one day. After that I'll ride the Amstel Gold Race and the Flèche wallonne but my big hope is to get a start at the Giro d'Italia and help Alberto Contador to win it."

Vladimir Isaychev (Katusha), Louis Meintjes (MTN-Qhubeka), Marco Minaard (Wanty-Groupe Gobert), Thomas Boudat (Europcar) and Benoît Jarrier (Bretagne-Séché Environnement) broke away early on and built up a maximum lead of five minutes.

"I was up there to defend Jacques' [Janse van Rensburg] KOM jersey," explained the South African who took over from his teammate. "We had to take away the points. We're all good climbers and we had several cards to play in the finale and also to keep Stephen [Cummings] fresh for the last lap."

Another MTN-Qhubeka rider, Merhawi Kudus, was part of that counter-attack with Jan Bakelants (Ag2r-La-Mondiale), Pierre Rolland (Europcar), Alex Howes (Cannondale-Garmin), Tiago Machado (Katusha) while Pierrick Fédrigo (Bretagne-Séché Environnement) and Leonardo Duque (Colombia) that bridged the gap as well on the last lap.

With 12km to go, the yellow jersey group was at thirty seconds. Boaro and defending champion Ramunas Navardauskas (Cannondale-Garmin) jumped over at the bottom of the last ascent to the Mont des Avaloirs and the Italian proved to be the fastest.

"I'm very frustrated," Rolland said. "We were too many together for the stage win. I came second in stage 1 of the Volta Catalunya, second again today. I did pretty well at the Giro d'Italia last year (4th) but I haven't won a race for two years. I'm not rewarded for my efforts today." His last win was at the Mont des Avaloirs in the 2013 Circuit de la Sarthe.

There's one stage remaining for Boaro to be crowned the overall winner of the 63rd Circuit de la Sarthe-Pays de la Loire.

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