Alexander Kristoff wins stage 2 of Arctic Race of Norway

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Alexander Kristoff (Katusha-Alpecin) won stage 2 of the Arctic Race of Norway after he took flight in the novel bunch sprint on the runway at Bardufoss Airport. The freshly-crowned European champion delivered a powerful effort in the final 200 metres to claim a dominant victory ahead of Hugo Hofstetter (Cofidis) and Andrea Pasqualon (Wanty-Groupe Gobert)

Dylan Teuns (BMC) finished safely in the main peloton to retain his overall lead. The Belgian succeeded in clipping off the front on the final lap of the finishing circuit to take third at the final intermediate sprint and pick up a bonus second for his troubles.

Truls Korsaeth (Astana) had led on the penultimate passage through the finish line after a spirited solo attack in a mammoth gear, but the Norwegian had sorely miscalculated his effort. The youngster raised his arms in celebration as he crossed the line before the sound of the bell alerted him to his error. To his credit, he survived another couple of kilometres off the front before he was pegged back by the bunch.

The race had earlier been animated by a six-man move featuring Erwann Corbel (Fortuneo-Oscaro), Dimitri Claeys (Cofidis), Elias Spikseth (Team Fixit.no), Nikolay Mihaylov (CCC-Sprandi Polkowice), Javier Megias Leal (Novo Nordisk) and Zhandos Bizhigitov (Astana), but on terrain that lent itself so obviously to a sprint finish, they were never likely to stay away.

Kristoff’s Katusha-Alpecin squad was prominent on the final lap, with Reto Hollenstein leading into the final kilometre on the wide and exposed runway, before Michael Mørkøv expertly guided Kristoff to the final 200 metres.

“We came to the Arctic Race to win a stage. Yesterday, I just missed out but today I won to keep the good run of the last few weeks,” said Kristoff, who responded to a disappointing Tour de France by winning the RideLondon Classic and the European Championships of successive weekends.

Kristoff is set to leave Katusha for UAE-Emirates at the end of the season, but he paid tribute to the cohesion of his red guard here. Kristoff received something of an armchair ride to the final sprint.

“The team did really well. Reto did a really good job, and then Michael put me in a perfect position. It was almost impossible to lose from there,” Kristoff said of the runway finale. “It was a little bit difficult to know how to handle it but we mastered it well. Michael has a good eye for this kind of sprint. He just cruised me to the front, and I knew if I stayed on his wheel, I’d win.”

In the overall ranking, Teuns only has two seconds lead over points classification leader Pasqualon, who accumulated eleven seconds in time bonuses with finishing third two days in a row and winning one intermediate sprint. But the Belgian knows stage 3 suits him better than anybody else with an uphill finish.

“I wasn’t surprised that we had to ride almost all day at the front of the peloton because yesterday we didn’t want to do any work so we had to take our responsibilities today," the winner of the Tour de Wallonie and the Tour de Pologne commented at the end. “It was OK because we only had to use two guys. I need all my team-mates in the next two days. The second bonus I took today is important but I was trying to take three seconds! I went off road because I had some troubles. It was difficult to take that one second but at the end that second might count. It’ll need to give everything on the final climb tomorrow to make sure I can gain some time on other riders.”

Teuns is the hot favorite but he’s also aware that the conclusive stage in Tromsø on Sunday is likely to turn the classification upside down.

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