Demare wins stage 2 of Eneco Tour

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Showing the form that won him the recent RideLondon Classic, Arnaud Demare (FDJ) took a definitive sprint victory in stage 2 of the Eneco Tour, featuring an uphill drag to the line in Vorst. BMC led-out the sprint for world champion Philippe Gilbert, but the Belgian had to settle for second, followed by Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Sharp) in third.

Today's result would be the ninth time this season Gilbert placed in the top three, but he's still searching for his first victory of the year.

"It was perfect," Gilbert said. "I thought this would be my moment. I had to do a sprint of 200 meters uphill, which I normally can. But [Arnaud] Démare came pretty fast and I couldn't respond."

Not only did the 21-year-old Frenchman take the stage win, but he took over the leader's jersey from Mark Renshaw (Belkin), who suffered a flat tire at 2km to go and was unable to contest the finale. The uphill finish created splits in the peloton with only the first 11 finishers credited with the winning time. The next 20 finishers were five seconds back, and that's the group where Renshaw was placed by the race officials.

As a result, Demare now leads Renshaw by three seconds, while Gilbert moves up to third on general classification at four seconds.

"That flat tire is a shame because my legs felt good again," said Renshaw. "This was another stage that suited me, I really expected to compete for the win here. I also hoped to retain my jersey."

The Eneco Tour peloton remained in Belgium for stage 2, covering 177km between Ardooie and Vorst. Once again there was an early break, this time containing four riders: Gediminas Bagdonas (AG2R La Mondiale), Mat Hayman (Sky) plus Topsport Vlaanderen-Baloise teammates Laurens De Vreese and Tim Declercq. The Belgian Pro Continental squad again put two men in the early escape, with De Vreese going out on the attack for the second straight day.

Unlike the opening stage which was devoid of any categorised climbs, today the Eneco Tour peloton faced six ascents of the typically punchy, Belgian variety.

While the escape group pushed out a lead of more than seven minutes, by the time they hit the penultimate ascent, the Alsemberg at 20km to go, the gap had dropped to two minutes. Omega Pharma-QuickStep applied pressure on the climb with Niki Terpstra jumping away from the field with Matti Breschel (Saxo-Tinkoff) quickly joining the Dutchman.

On the day's final climb, the Bruine Put at 14km to go, Bagdonas cracked, leaving three riders in the lead. Hayman had upped the pace and went over the climb first with a slight gap on De Vreese and Declercq, but the Belgians managed to re-connect with the veteran Australian.

At 10km to go Bagdonas, Terpstra and Breschel were absorbed, while the three escapees still enjoyed a lead of one minute.

Hoping for a sprint finale, Orica-GreenEdge, Belkin, Argos-Shimano, BMC, FDJ and Garmin-Sharp all contributed riders to the chase and the lead trio's advantage began to vaporise. Their lead was more than halved at 5km to go and the catch was made with 2km remaining.

Just as the break was neutralised with the peloton building up to the sprint crescendo, race leader Mark Renshaw (Belkin) suffered an untimely flat tire and was unable to contest the finale.

The final drag to the line was slightly uphill, with BMC working for world champion Philippe Gilbert. FDJ's Arnaud Demare, however, marked Gilbert and just as the Belgian began his kick to the line the Frenchman jumped around him with 200 metres to go and accelerated away for the clear victory.

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