Tour de Suisse: Viviani beats Matthews and Sagan to win stage 4

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Elia Viviani (Deceuninck-QuickStep) claimed his first victory since March on stage 4 of the Tour de Suisse, beating Michael Matthews (Team Sunweb) and Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) in a bunch sprint in Arlesheim.

All the major sprinters survived the late third-category climb to contest the sprint, though Tour de France champion Geraint Thomas (Team Ineos) crashed out of the race with 30km to go and was taken to hospital.

After a messy run down into Arlesheim, in which Matej Mohoric (Bahrain-Merida) and Mathias Frank (AG2R La Mondiale) launched speculative attacks, Viviani’s team took control in the final two kilometres and executed a near-perfect lead out.

Kasper Asgreen led them to the flamme rouge, making way for Yves Lampaert, before Viviani’s trusted lead-out man Michael Morkov took him to 200 metres. Viviani and Sagan opened their sprints at the same time, but the Italian champion pulled away in the final 50 metres, turning the tables after finishing second to the Slovakian on the previous day’s uphill finish.

Despite initially matching Viviani, Sagan faded and launched a slightly desperate long-range bike throw but was pipped for second place by Matthews, who came up fast on the right-hand side. Matteo Trentin (Mitchelton-Scott) finished a more distant fourth, his legs sapped by having to charge up the side of the pack in the wind before the others had thought about sprinting.

"Yesterday we planned it really well but on a finish like that Sagan is hard to beat. Today, we knew the hard point would be the climb, not the sprint, so when I got over the climb I had tired legs but thought if I see 200m to go I’ll just do the best sprint I can. The guys did an amazing job, it was a perfect lead-out and I’m pretty proud of my team," Viviani said.

Viviani also noted that "it’s a long time since I won", with no success at a frustrating Giro d’Italia last month. "This means a lot because we’re a few weeks away from the Tour de France," he added. "It’s my first win at the Tour de Suisse, and I can be happy with that, as it shows I’m on the way up to the main goal of the season."

In the overall standings, Sagan retained the yellow jersey and still leads the race by 10 seconds, though the bonus seconds awarded to the top three mean that it’s now Matthews in second place. Asgreen sits third at 15 seconds, with Rohan Dennis (Bahrain-Merida) fourth at 16 seconds.

How it unfolded

The 163.9km stage from Murten to Arlesheim ran flat until the steep Passwang climb just past the halfway mark, before undulating terrain led to the third-category Eichenberg climb that topped out with 15km to go.

A four-man breakaway – Robin Carpenter (Rally UHC), Simon Geschke (CCC Team), Gian Friesecke (Switzerland), Taco van der Hoorn (Jumbo-Visma) – went clear after 15 kilometres but were kept on a relatively short leash all day.

Sagan’s Bora-Hansgrohe did the lion’s share of the work in the peloton as the gap never went out much beyond the three-minute mark. Van der Hoorn was first over the top of the Passwang, at which point the gap stood at 2:30.

After a fast descent, the road flattened out and Thomas’ race came to an end. He crashed at speed along with Andrey Zeits (Astana) and both received roadside treatment before being taken to hospital for medical checks. The Tour de France champion sat upright on the tarmac and was able to move his upper body but suffered abrasions to his shoulders and a cut above his right eye.

The race went on, and ignited on the Eichenberg – 3km at 7.5 per cent. Friesecke and Geschke went on the attack from the break, before Friesecke dropped the German and went it alone. He reached the summit with a lead of 50 seconds over the peloton, though the road continued to rise past the KOM point and to the second intermediate sprint. There his lead plummeted, and he was caught just before the start of the descent.

Matthews’ Sunweb team had taken control, and led through Marc Hirschi. Mohoric launched an attack on a downhill section with 6km to go, sparking a brief flurry in which Frank and then Stefan Kung (Groupama-FDJ) tried to accelerate away. With 3km to go, Bora regained control but soon Trek-Segafredo came through with plenty of numbers.

QuickStep, however, came through at the right time with a text-book lead-out train. Sagan was on Viviani’s wheel, followed by Matthews, and it was those three who battled it out in the sprint. Viviani went to the left of Morkov, Sagan to the right, but the Italian made no mistake, while Matthews had the speed to come around the three-time world champion.

Trentin made an impressive charge but found himself too far back without teammates in the final kilometre, while Trek-Segafredo were unable to use their numbers and saw Jasper Stuyven sprinting – to fifth place – ahead of John Degenkolb in 12th.

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