CRO Race: Orluis Aular wins stage 5 to move into overall lead

Orluis Aular (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) won stage 5 of the CRO Tour in Labin to move into the overall lead with a day remaining. The Venezuelan champion proved the quickest in a technical bunch finale, beating Alexander Kristoff (Uno-X) and Ethan Hayter (Ineos) to the line.

Overnight leader Magnus Sheffield (Ineos) crashed when he clipped a curb in the last 500m, though he was able to remount and complete the stage, and he will remain in contention for overall honours on Sunday’s final stage in Zagreb.

Stage 5 was animated by a break composed of Fran Miholjevic (Bahrain Victorious), Jonas Rapp (Team Hrinkow Advarics) and Artur Sowinksi (Voster ATS Team), but they were reeled in by the peloton on the cusp of the finishing circuit.

Miholjevic was the last man standing when he took the bell with 18km to go, but Uno-X quickly shut down his 25-second buffer. From there, a bunch finish was inevitable, though there was considerable reluctance among the sprinters’ teams to take up the pace-making too soon.

Ineos came to the fore with intent inside the final 3km, with Luke Plapp producing a long, long stint of pace-making.

Connor Swift through the twisting final kilometre and when he swung off with a shade over 300m to go, Kristoff found himself on the front a touch sooner than he had anticipated. He also had Aular parked on his wheel, and the Venezuelan produced a crisp sprint to claim the day’s spoils.

Kristoff kicked again in the closing metres but he couldn’t quite overhaul Aular to take the win, while the Ineos duo of Hayter and Elia Viviani (Ineos) also closed rapidly but had to settle for third and fourth, respectively.

Behind, Sheffield was gingerly remounting after his late crash. The American seemed to try to hop a curb in a bid to avoid being squeezed out on a corner but he was unable to avoid falling.

In the overall standings, Aulnar carries a lead of 9 seconds into the final stage over the Ineos duo of Hayter and Sheffield, with Kristoff fourth at 12 seconds and Nicolò Parisini (Q36.5) fifth at 14 seconds.

Results

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