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Eneco Tour 2016: Stage 4

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Welcome to our live coverage of stage 4 of the 2016 Eneco Tour, a tough, undulating 202km leg from Aalter to St-Pieters-Leeuw. 

 

Hi there, and a warm welcome back to our live coverage of the Eneco Tour. It may be September, but this Dutch/Belgian race lets us pretend it's spring, and today's stage four sees the terrain start to get pretty lumpy, with some cobbles thrown in for good measure. 

As we pick up the action, there are just over 100km remaining, so we're pretty much half-way through. There's a four-man breakaway with a lead of around four minutes - we'll bring you the names in a second - but the terrain becomes increasingly difficult as the stage goes on. 

The gap to the breakaway is falling quite quickly now, and they currently have less than two minutes over the bunch, where the pace is high with the cobbles having begun. 

80km to go and it seems our breakaway quartet won't be out there for too much longer. The gap is now under a minute and falling all the time. 

The four leaders look over their shoulders and can see the rapidly-advancing peloton. The pace is really high back there with a number of riders keen to push on. 

60km remaining from 202km

Tom Dumoulin is on the attack.

The Giant-Alpecin rider heads off the front of the bunch, some riders try to follow, and the race is starting to split up. 

Dumoulin is joined by a handful of riders but he kicks on again. 

Several injections of pace have followed that catch, with Niki Terpstra among those to accelerate and just test the water.

This is racing of the uncontrolled variety we're used to seeing at the Classics. Riders one after another just pinging off the front. 

Nelson Oliveira is the latest to attack and he opens up a sizeable gap. He's joined by Nico Denz, who comes through for a turn only after considerable persuasion. 

Oliveira and Denz are working well together now and they have 10 seconds over the bunch here, which is still splitting up under the pressure. Riders off the front, riders off the back. 

46km remaining from 202km

The duo's escape comes to nought as they're caught by a group of eight or so that has clipped off the front of the bunch. 

Nathan Haas is drilling it on the front for Edvald Boasson Hagen. This is a big, strong group, and there are three riders in between them and the bunch. The gaps, however, are tiny. 

40km remaining from 202km

The Astana duo took advantage of a lull in the pace after that strong leading group was caught. 

32km remaining from 202km

It's straight onto the cobbles as they hit the Brabantsebaan once again. There are pretty wide sections of smooth concrete on either side of the pavé, which is where most of the riders find themselves. 

Crash. An Astana rider comes down as the bunch is forced to take on a nasty U-turn on gravel as the road switches from pavé to tarmac. It's Laurens de Vreese, and he gets back up and is on his way. 

Sky hit the front now as there are more cobbled suburban streets now. The riders are on the pavements here. 25 seconds is the gap.

26km remaining from 202km

Tom Dumoulin is making his way over to Martin. That's quite a duo.

Daniel Oss (BMC) leads the chase in the bunch. 

Martin and Dumoulin are in no-man's land here. They're equidistant between the two groups and the Dutchman doesn't know what to do for the best. He waves his hand at Martin - they're not closing in on the two leaders here. To commit or not?

19km remaining from 202km

Martin and Dumoulin are caught.

12km remaining from 202km

11km remaining from 202km

The leading trio extend their lead now, back up slightly to 12 seconds, but the odds are still stacked against them. 

Jay Thompson hits the front for Boasson Hagen, while Lampre-Merida also show an interest for Sacha Modolo. 

5km remaining from 202km

Replays shows the cause of that disruption at the roundabout - a motorcycle up ahead crashed as it came round and riders had to avoid it. 

3km remaining from 202km

2km remaining from 202km

2km remaining from 202km

Katusha make their presence felt while FDJ come up on the right. 

Here we go then

Demare up there. Sagan biding his time.

Greipel takes it! Photo finish

Or is it Sagan? So close!

We see the photo finish as it is indeed Sagan, by a tyre's width. The world champion receives the belated news and punches the air. 

Sagan bumped shoulders with Demare before taking Kristoff's slipstream and powering past. Greipel was coming through really strongly on the left but just ran out of road, and Sagan secured the win with a superior bike throw. 

Sagan picks up 10 bonus seconds for that victory and consequently is the new leader of the race, taking over the white jersey from Rohan Dennis. 

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