Tour Down Under: Sam Welsford sprints to seventh Tour Down Under victory and first for Ineos Grenadiers in chaotic stage 3 finale

It was a brutal day that came right down to the wire for a heroic breakaway effort, but it was a mad dash to the line by the sprinters on stage 3 of the Tour Down Under. After receiving a strong leadout from his teammate Ben Swift, Sam Welsford had the power to take the win for the first time with his new team, Ineos Grenadiers.

Welsford screamed with delight as he crossed the line victorious before slumping to the floor and being congratulated by his teammates, who gave their all for the Australian fast man.

Tobias Lund Andresen (Decathlon CMA CGM) took second, and Lewis Bower (Groupama-FDJ United) rounded off the podium in Nairne.

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Race leader Jay Vine (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) was held up by a crash in the finale but was awarded the same time as the winner due to the three kilometre rule.

“I’m so lost for words. That was so hard, we were in so much trouble at the back, I was at my absolute limit on that last climb but Ben [Swift] was just with me saying we’ll get back, I'm so happy,” Welsford said of his seventh Tour Down Under stage victory.

“I really wanted to set up the new year well and the team really believed in me and got the belief back after losing it myself. I'm just over the moon, I can't believe it.”

Enzo Paleni (Groupama-FDJ United) gave his all after a whole day in the breakaway with Baptiste Veistroffer (Lotto-Intermarché) and Martin Urianstad (Uno-X Mobility), with the Frenchman going to almost 500 metres to go in the stage. Urianstad took all the KOM points to extend his lead in that classification, and Veistroffer nabbed all the intermediate sprint points.

Vine retained the race lead with six seconds on his teammate Jhonatan Narváez. Mauro Schmid is in third at 1:05 down, followed by Harry Sweeny a further seven seconds back in fourth place.

Lund Andresen remained in the lead of sprint classification, Urianstad increased his lead in the mountains classification, and Michael Leonard (EF Education-Easypost) retained the white best young riders jersey.

Stage 4 was set to be a heavy climbing day, but the removal of Willunga Hill due to fire dangers means it will be a punchier stage on the penultimate day of racing.

How it unfolded

It was a real test for the riders on the fourth day of racing in Australia as the temperatures really began to soar. For stage 3, it was a toasty 140.8km of racing with new start and finish locations of Henley Beach and Nairne, respectively. A bunch sprint was the most likely scenario after the brutal day on stage 2 and the triple ascent of Willunga Hill on stage 4. The route wasn’t particularly flat, however, so the fast men had their work cut out to get to the finish in good enough shape to sprint for the win in Nairne.

There were two non-starters, Jonas Rutsch and Lennert Van Eetvelt, both of Lotto-Intermarché, who had crashed on stage 2.

After a long neutral zone, the riders got going with an immediate attack from Enzo Paleni (Groupama-FDJ United), Baptiste Veistroffer (Lotto-Intermarché) and Martin Urianstad (Uno-X Mobility). The peloton was very happy with this break and sat up to allow the trio to go up the road, and they quickly got over a two-minute gap.

Back in the pack it was similar to stage 1 with Visma-Lease a Bike and Ineos Grenadiers doing the main bulk of the work. However, Decathlon CMA CGM also had a rider working after Tobias Lund Andresen took the win in Tanunda. The gap was brought right down to 1:45 and was held around that for a considerable length of time.

It looked lovely and steady on the first climb of the day, Wickham Hill, for the breakaway with Urianstad rolling across the KOM line to take the 10 points to add to his advantage to 19 points over Pepijn Reinderink (Soudal-QuickStep). Behind him rolling across was Veistroffer and Paleni with Lucas Hamilton (Ineos Grenadiers) mopping up the final couple of points from the peloton two minutes later.

With just over 80km to go, the riders made it to the first intermediate sprint of the day with Veistroffer rolling across the line first taking the three points and bonus seconds, followed by Paleni and Urianstad as their gap back to the bunch hovered between 1:25 and 1:45.

The peloton was being strung out into the final 60km as the breakaway tried to play with the gap a bit. They slowed right down out front to force the bunch to back off but then kicked off again with the pace which forced a reaction from the peloton. The gap was being held around the 1:30 mark.

Most of the teams were riding in colour order behind the main four squads doing the lion’s share of the work. Lots of the riders emptied bottles of water over their heads every time they rode through a feed zone or went back to the car. It was a tough ride in the 30ºC degree heat.

Just over 40km to go came the second and final intermediate sprint of the day in Echunga, with the break sweeping up all the bonus seconds led across the line by Veistroffer with Paleni and Urianstad.

Behind, suddenly, attacks came flying out of the peloton led by Rudy Porter (Jayco AlUla) with Damien Howson (Australia) and Embret Svestad-Bårdseng (Ineos Grenadiers) but then Adam Yates (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and race leader Vine both joined the move and that killed things off.

Patrick Eddy (Australia) then launched with three others following the newly crowned Australian national champion. Robert Stannard (Bahrain Victorious), Chris Hamilton (Picnic PostNL) and Svestad-Bårdseng with Santiago Buitrago (Bahrain Victorious) latching on. Stannard pushed on solo, but the peloton was controlling well with Ineos Grenadiers doing the majority of the work and that saw Stannard sit up.

While all that went on, the break was still pushing very hard and held their advantage and even extended it as Ineos Grenadiers and Visma-Lease a Bike retook control of the peloton.

Into the final 30km, and the break really started pushing the pace heading onto the final categorised climb of the day, Mount Barker. They managed to drag their advantage back above a minute again. Behind, there was an attack by Titouan Fontaine (Groupama-FDJ United) through a feed zone. A rather strange move but he flew across the gap to his teammate and the other breakaway riders.

Up front, Urianstad rolled across the KOM point again, taking the five points ahead of Veistroffer and Paleni. Fontaine realised he wasn’t getting anywhere with his move and was swallowed up just before cresting Mount Barker by the peloton led by Visma-Lease a Bike, Decathlon CMA CGM and UAE Team Emirates-XRG with Ineos Grenadiers also up there en masse.

With just over 20km to go, Urianstad started to struggle with the power of Paleni and Veistroffer really taking its toll on the Norwegian rider, who had been in the breakaway for three days in a row. He did get back on but was clearly suffering as they crossed the finish line for the first time of two.

It seemed very cagey in the peloton as several teams had their trains spread across the front of the bunch. And the pace clearly wasn’t high enough as the break extended their advantage to 1:20 with Urianstad doing one final big turn for his breakaway friends before sitting up and being absorbed by the peloton again.

Visma-Lease a Bike, Tudor, Bahrain Victorious, UAE Team Emirates-XRG, Lidl-Trek and Decathlon- CMA CGM all lead the bunch with 15km to go, with the gap slowly ticking down to the breakaway as they head back to Nairne. XDS-Astana, Ineos Grenadiers and Soudal-Quickstep also joined the push on the front. Out front, Veistroffer wasn’t able to continue with the brutal pace of Paleni as the Groupama-FDJ United rider kicked clear with 13km to go as the gap dropped below 50 seconds.

Quite amazingly, Veistroffer made it back to Paleni again after losing touch on a nasty drag. Veistroffer got over a massive gear and made it back to his fellow countryman. They continued to hold about 40 seconds of a gap over the peloton, which was still lined up in team colour order. They just weren’t closing down the gap to the two Frenchmen.

Veistroffer lost touch on the final little kicker but gave his all with Paleni. But the time gap just completely disappeared over the climb. Veistroffer got caught by the bunch led by NSN and Visma-Lease a Bike but Paleni still had 10 seconds with 2km to go.

Paleni held on all the way until 500 metres to go where the sprinters' teams finally took over. Visma-Lease a Bike had placed Brennan on Lund Andresen’s wheel as Tord Gudmestad (Decathlon CMA CGM) launched his leadout. However, it was too early and they were swamped.

Ineos Grenadiers flew down the right hand side of the peloton with Michal Kwiatkowski and Swift dragging Welsford through to the front. And when Welsford launched, there was no stopping him as he powered to victory with Bower following the slipstream and was only overtaken by Lund Andresen, with the Dane taking second and the New Zealander taking third.

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