Pays de la Loire Tour: Antoine L'Hote thrills home crowd with first career victories as stage 4 win also delivers GC title

Antoine L'Hote (Decathlon CMA CGM) won the final stage of the Pays de la Loire Tour and with it the overall title after attacking 23km from the finish of the 179.5km stage to Le Mans.

The 20-year-old dropped his breakaway companions Sam Maisonobe (Cofidis) and Tobias Svarre (Uno-X Mobility) on the hilly local circuit to go it alone into the last of five laps.

Behind L'Hote, race leader and stage 3 winner Alexander Kamp (Uno-X Mobility) led the chase, attacking with 6.5km to go and taking Corbin Strong (NSN), Clément Venturini (Unibet Rose Rockets), and Quinten Hermans (Pinarello-Q36.5) with him.

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Kamp, who led L'Hote by four seconds going into the day, had to catch and beat the Frenchman at the finish, as L'Hote had picked up three bonus seconds during his attack.

In the end, despite the Dane's best efforts, L'Hote held on to take the stage by three seconds as Strong and Venturini led the chase home for second and third.

As a result, Kamp, who finished fourth on the stage, relinquished his leader's jersey to L'Hote on the very last day of the four-stage race. L'Hote, a neo-pro this season, celebrates his first stage victory and first stage race victory at the same time.

He won the race with a 12-second margin over Kamp, while Strong leapt up seven places on the final GC to finish third overall, 18 seconds down.

“I don’t think even I realise it,” L'Hote told L'Equipe TV after his win. “ I felt from the start that I had the legs, but to do this today… I’m savouring it.

"I feel like it was meant to be because people have been telling me since December that I’m going to be playing a significant role in the Pays de la Loire region. My first professional victory in my first professional year, it’s just too emotional."

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