Tour of Utah: Britton wins Big Cottonwood Canyon time trial

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Rob Britton (Rally Cycling) powered to the stage win in the Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah's uphill individual time trial at Big Cottonwood Canyon on stage 3. The Canadian topped Serghei Tvetcov (Jelly Belly-Maxxis) by 13 seconds, with Gavin Mannion (UnitedHealthcare) in third at 26 seconds.

The performance puts Britton into the race lead after James Piccoli (Elevate-KHS), Brent Bookwalter (BMC Racing) and overnight leader Sepp Kuss (Rally) all fell shy of the top 10 on the stage. Britton now leads the race over Mannion by 26 seconds, with Tvetcov in third at 28 seconds.

In the post-race press conference, Britton, who finished fifth overall last year, said he put a big target on this stage.

"I was really excited when I saw there was going to be an uphill time trial at this race," he said. "It’s something that kind of suits my strengths pretty well. I prepared also for this stage in particular doing specific stuff."

Britton blasted out of the start gate, and over the first half of the course finished just one second shy of Tvetcov's split time. He went 14 seconds better than Tvetcov over the second half to take the win.

"I tried to go out with the governor pretty off and tried to go into the red, because I knew kind of around that 2K to go and you crest over 8,000 feet mark, that's when it really starts to get hard with oxygen debt, and that's pretty much what happened," he said. "At that point I just kind of held on for dear life and just started to see the watts slip away and hope that I could minimize the damage and hold on in the last 500 metres. But I'm really happy with how it all wrapped up."

Tvetcov compared the course to the uphill time trial in Vail, Colorado, at the now-defunct USA Pro Challenge, where he placed third behind Tejay van Garderen and Tom Danielson in 2014. He went one better Wednesday in Utah.

"My hope was to go as hard as I can," Tvetcov said of his approach to the stage. "I didn't really think about time or anything else, because you put yourself under pressure and it's like no way. So finally I got a good time."

Mannion took a different approach, but it also paid off with a podium spot.

"I kind of just tried to ride a steady pace, even though the first half was a lot faster," the UnitedHealthcare rider said. "It was kind of hard to do power toward the end. I just kind of went out at a good tempo and was definitely suffering and felt pretty terrible all day. And I was actually pretty surprised at the result at the end. It was a good day. I'm happy with the effort I did, and Rob and Serghei really ripped it. It's going to be a good four days of racing left."

How it unfolded

The 9km uphill time trial was not exceptionally steep, but the altitude – the race climbed 525.8 metres, finishing at 2,675 metres above sea level – provided plenty of challenges for the riders, who were restricted to standard road bike setups for the race.

Cylance Pro Cycling's Bryan Lewis set the best early time, going just over 20 minutes at 20:09. The time for Lewis, who started ninth on the day, held for more than half an hour before Bardiani CSF's Simone Sterbini came in with the first time under 20 minutes, crossing the line in 19:10 and the new fastest mark.

Several riders nearly toppled Sterbini's time over the next 30 minutes, with UnitedHealthcare's Janier Acevedo coming closest at 19:18. But Sterbini's lead held until BMC's Manuel Senni crossed the line under three seconds better at 19:07. Senni didn't even have time to settle into the hot seat, however, before Bardiani CSF's Giulio Ciccone broke the 19-minute barrier at 18:59.

Looking resplendent in his first opportunity to wear the US stars-and-stripes jersey he won in June, BMC's Joey Rosskopf set the new fastest time another handful of minutes later, crossing the line at 18:55 to take the lead.

Unfortunately for Rosskopf, the top times were falling regularly as the GC riders hit the course. Jelly Belly-Maxxis' Serghei Tvetcov hit the gas over the last half of the course and carved 13 seconds off Rosskopf's time, coming in at 18:42.

Among the final 10 starters, Britton covered the first half of the course with the second-fastest time at that point, going one-second slower than Tvetcov at the halfway mark. Britton then flew up the second half of the course, setting a new best time of 18:29, another 13 seconds better than Tvetcov.

The biggest surprise of the final 10 riders came from BMCs Brent Bookwalter, who crossed the first check point more than 40 seconds behind Tvetcov's top split.

UnitedHealthcare's Gavin Mannion put in a good ride, finishing two-tenths of a second better than Rosskopf at 18:55. BMC's Silvan Dillier finished next, 1:24 down on Britton. Robin Carpenter (Holowesko-Citadel) came in 13th fastest, 58:19 behind Britton's time.

Elevate-KHS rider James Piccoli, starting the day third overall, lost 1:10 to Britton, while Bookwalter crossed with a disappointing time of 19:15, 46 seconds down on Britton.

Kuss was only 25 seconds down on Britton's time at the halfway point, and the 22-year-old came in with a time of 19:33 at the finish, 1:03 behind the winner.

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