Paris-Nice: Greipel wins in Saint-Amand-Montrond

Image 1 of 69

André Greipel finished off the hard work of his Lotto Soudal team with a well played long sprint victory on the second stage of Paris-Nice in Saint Amond Montrond. The German champion edged out French champion Arnaud Démare (FDJ) and John Degenkolb (Giant-Alpecin).

Michal Kwiatkowski (Etixx-Quickstep) held onto the yellow jersey, but Degenkolb pulled himself closer to the race lead with the time bonus, and is now third at three seconds behind Rohan Dennis (BMC).

It's not often that the early sprint wins in a headwind finish, but Greipel muscled his way to the line, holding off the fast-charging Demare, who left it perhaps just a little late.

"It was a bit of a headwind sprint. Arnaud (Demare) came in fast but I managed to hold my lead," Greipel said. "I'd like to give this victory to my mother, she is having a very hard time at the moment. Don't give up!"

The sprint was very nearly foiled by a late attack from former world time trial champion Tony Martin, who stood to take the leader's jersey from his teammate Kwiatkowski. Lotto Soudal dug deep to pull back Martin, who had help from Lars Boom (Astana) and Sky's Geraint Thomas.

"It was a bit of the mess in the finale, we didn't really know what was happening when Martin, Thomas and Boom went. They are three great time trial riders but fortunately we didn't lose our calm and we managed to catch them," Greipel said.

"It's important to win for the first time on Paris-Nice. It's a big race with some of the best sprinters in the peloton. Yesterday, we really didn't take part in the sprint. Today we wanted to do it better It's a team work, I win with them and I lose with them. So I was glad I was able to deliver today."

Alexander Kristoff (Katusha), winner of stage 1, stood a chance at taking the race lead through time bonuses before stage 4's mountains, but after lacking power in the finale has turned his focus toward keeping the green jersey.

"Today it didn't go as well as yesterday. I found myself too far from the action and I lost a lot of energy to try and make it back to the front," Kristoff said. "As a result I didn't have good enough legs to do a good sprint. In the intermediate sprint, I managed to take some points but I was not as well later on. I know there's another chance tomorrow and I will try to get another one and to score points to try and keep this green jersey."

The second stage of Paris-Nice started under a cloud, literally and figuratively, as all of France mourned the loss of three sportsmen in a helicopter crash in Argentina. The deaths included Nacer Bouhanni's friend and fellow boxer Alexis Vastine, 28, and the Cofidis rider started the day by wearing a black jersey in mourning.

The race also began without Tom Boonen (Etixx-Quickstep), who separated his shoulder and fractured his elbow in a crash in the opening stage, and will miss the Spring Classics as a result.

The first action of the day was a solo attack by Arnaud Gerard of Bretagne-Seche Environnement at the gun. The Frenchman was given a long leash, up to 8:25 at kilometer 60 as the peloton cruised along at only 35.3kph. After two hours, the speed had dropped to under 35kph.

The intermediate sprint in St. Pierre de Jards at 57.5km and St Amand Montrond at 127km provided some action, with Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) claiming the two bonus seconds over John Degenkolb (Giant-Alpecin) in the first, and Degenkolb beating Michael Matthews (Orica-GreenEdge) for the second sprint, both behind Gerard.

Cofidis and Europcar finally came to the front to spark a serious chase. By the time the race reached the only difficulty of the day, the cote de la Tour, Gerard's lead had dropped to just over a minute. Behind, him Philippe Gilbert (BMC) used the climb to try to spark a move. The Belgian was followed by Jonathan Hivert (Bretagne-Seche Environnement) and Laurens De Vreese (Astana) in a brief breakaway over the top, but the peloton was not willing to let them go. With 38km to race, the peloton was all back together.

Thanks to his point atop the hill, Hivert kept his polka dot jersey as best climber in the race.

With 30km to go, no team had committed to controlling the pace, but a few kilometers later, Cannondale-Garmin poured on the gas at the front, while at the back FDJ's Sebastian Chavanel punctured and faced a long, hard chase through the team cars.

Chavanel made it back, but with 13.2km to go, another French sprinter, Europcar's Bryan Coquard, punctured and focussed the French TV producer's attention at the back of the race.

With 10km to go, the pace let up, with Etixx-Quickstep, Lampre, Astana and Cannondale-Garmin all at the front but unwilling to expend too much energy. The slowing allowed Coquard to rejoin the peloton with teammate Thomas Voeckler's help.

Tony Martin (Etixx) lit up the pace with 9.5km to go, and only 7 seconds behind race leader and teammate Michal Kwiatkowski, he presented a potential new leader. He was joined by Geraint Thomas (Sky, +13 seconds) and Lars Boom (Astana, +10 seconds). Matthi Breschel (Tinkoff-Saxo) bridged across, but at 59 seconds on GC, he was less of a threat.

Lotto Soudal, LottoNl-Jumbo and Lampre brought the gap down to shouting distance, and Breschel threw in the towel, leaving the other three to fight to hold their lead.

The trio couldn't hold off the chase from Lotto-Soudal, and with 1.6km to go they were caught and the sprint was on.

Greipel lit out first and managed to hold off the charge from Degenkolb and Arnaud Demare to take his first win of Paris-Nice.

Full Results