Etoile de Bessèges: Tobias Halland Johannessen wins stage 4

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Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team) secured the stage 4 victory at the top of the Mont Bouquet at Etoile de Bessèges. The Norwegian rider out-paced a select group of four on the final climb to take the win ahead of Jay Vine (Alpecin-Fenix) and Antonio Tiberi (Trek-Segafredo).

Johannessen had picked up two third place finishes in the opening three stages and last year’s Tour de l'Avenir winner had a healthy lead in the youth category. 

He followed an attack by Vine on the final climb before having enough left at the finish to take victory.  The pair were joined at the front by Tiberi and Clement Champoussin (AG2R Citroën Team) for the final sprint for the line. However, they failed to trouble the leading two in the final jump with Vine taking second and Tiberi taking third. 

Race leader, Benjamin Thomas (Cofidis) and second placed Alberto Bettiol (EF Education-EasyPost) were dropped by the leading group on the final climb finishing 23 seconds down.

However, Thomas held on to his overall lead by seven seconds from Bettiol with Johannessen third at eight seconds going into the final stage.

The final stage on Sunday is an individual time trial over 11 kilometres with a 2.6-kilometre climb at an average of 5.4 per cent up to Site de l’Ermitage to finish.

How it unfolded

After winning the previous day attacking into Bessèges, Benjamin Thomas (Cofidis) had a seven-second lead coming into the fourth stage ahead of Alberto Bettiol (EF Education-EasyPost) while Mathieu Burgaudeau (TotalEnergies) sat a further eight seconds back. 

The fourth stage saw riders compete over 145 kilometres between Saint-Hilaire-de-Brethmas and the first category finish on Mont Bouquet – the hardest climb of this year’s race.  

It wasn’t just the finishing climb that was set to challenge competitors but also the second category Côte des Concluses topping out 31.5 kilometres from the finish. 

The day’s breakaway consisting of seven riders saw their gap go out to three minutes before being reeled back in to one minute and 46 seconds going into the last 70 kilometres of the race. 

Gardois Alexis Gougeard (B&B Hôtels-KTM), Flavien Maurelet (St-Michel Aubert 93), Samuel Leroux (Go Sport-Roubaix Lille Métropole), Georg Zimmermann (Intermarché-Wanty Gobert), Joel Suter (UAE), Emmanuel Morin (U Nantes Atlantique), Antoine Raugel (AG2R-Cirtroën) and Tony Gallopin (Trek-Segafredo). 

Pleasant conditions greeted riders in the south of France as the field was strung out being controlled by a host of teams including Uno-X Pro Cycling Team working for Johannessen. 

The controlled pegging back of the breakaway continued into the final 50 kilometres with the bunch sitting at 1-17 back. 

After crashing on the run to the finish the previous day Richard Carapaz (Ineos Grenadiers) was amongst those looking to impress on the Queen stage. 

The second category Côte des Concluses was the first test for riders coming with 32 kilometres remaining. 

Testing riders the climb had steeper sections of 4.6 per cent at the bottom before shallowing out making the climb a total of 5.8 kilometres in length at an average of 2.6 per cent.  

The breakaway had seen their lead reduced to 49 seconds onto the first test of the day with the bunch chasing hard behind ready for the climb. 

With the bunch approaching the breakaway started attacking causing a split with four riders going clear including Gallopin, Sutter, Zimmermann and Gougeard and their lead going back out to over a minute. 

As the pace increased on the rolling terrain approaching the last 30 kilometres Gallopin was next to fade leaving three leaders. 

EF Education–Easypost were driving the pace into the final climb and reducing the advantage of the three leaders to 26 seconds. 

As the bunch approached the breakaway Gougeard also dropped back before the remaining due were caught with five kilometres remaining. 

The final climb up to Le Mont Bouquet consisted of the last 4.6 kilometres at an average of 9.1% gradient and a maximum at 12% at the midway point. 

Ineos Grenadiers forced the pace on the finishing climb looking to set-up a bid for victory by Carapaz. 

Alberto Bettiol (EF Education-EasyPost) sat in second overall just seven seconds down at the start of the day and was monitoring the front along with race leader Thomas on the final climb and the front group reduced with 2.5 kilometres remaining. 

Jay Vine (Alpecin-Fenix) was the first rider to make a bid for glory with 1.8 kilometres remaining with just Johannessen able to follow. 

With the two riders ahead of him gapped Johannessen continued to ride with his breakaway partner with pair ready to battle out for victory. 

Behind race leader Thomas and Bettiol were also under pressure as they frantically chased to keep their places overall. 

Antonio Tiberi (Trek-Segafredo) and Clement Champoussin (AG2R Citroën Team) also came back to the leading two approaching the finish. 

However, Johannessen was strongest taking his first win of the season ahead of Vine and second and Tiberi third.