Four in a row for Paul Magnier at Tour of Guangxi as he keeps winning streak rolling in tight stage 4 sprint

Paul Magnier (Soudal-QuickStep) kept his winning streak alive on stage 4 of the Gree-Tour of Guangxi, continuing his clean sweep of the sprints with a tight battle to the line in Jinchengjiang.

As Magnier triumphed, he shook his head in happy disbelief after he crossed the line first for a fourth time in a row, this time ahead of Pavel Bittner (Picnic PostNL), who was also second on stage 2. Jordi Meeus (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe) took third.

The hilly 176.3km stage with 2,676m of elevation gain and two category 2 and 3 climbs ended in a sprint after a late attack was swept up within 5km of the line, setting Magnier up for another triumph. After sweeping up the sprint victories from stage 1 through to stage 3, he had a 20-second lead in the General Classification standings heading into stage 4. At the end of the day, he had bumped that up to 26 seconds, with three-time podium placer Meeus now in second on the overall.

The climbing continues to ramp up through to the stage from Bama to Jinchengjiang, but it hasn't been enough to curtail the sprinters or Magnier's run so far; that's likely to change on Saturday as the race heads into the dramatic scenery and karst peaks of Nongla for a summit finish.

"We had to control a super strong breakaway, which was hard, because eveyrone is starting to be quite tired after four hard days of racing and controlling all day, but in the end, the GC teams also helped to close the gap because we cannot let a two minute gap go," said Magnier.

"But I have to say that everybody here in the team had to pull super hard all day and I'm super happy to take the win in the sprint."

"Today I had to start from far – I lost the wheel a bit of my lead-out men, but in the end, I could make it on my own. Its a very long sprint, but with the speed we go here, on the saddle I could save a bit of aerodynamics maybe, but it was a super long and hard sprint."

Despite being more than 30 seconds ahead of all of the GC favourites, Magnier ruled out an all-in bid for the red jersey on stage 5, conceding that he will instead work for his teammates, to pay them back for all the work they've done in recent weeks.

"Tomorrow I will help my teammates for the GC, they will try to do their best, and on Sunday, it's going to be super hard, but if I can save a it of energy tomorrow, why not?

"I think I'm already really satisfied with four stage victories. My teammate, Antoine Huby, is without contract, and he's really motivated here and flying with good shape, so if i can help him get the best position possible before the climb, I will do it for him, because the team have worked hard all week for me."

How it unfolded

An attacking start once again at the Tour of Gaungxi on stage 4 saw several riders try to form an early breakaway, with King of the Mountains Simon Guglielmi (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) and Logan Currie (Lotto) forming the first notable move.

They were chased down and joined by Michael Leonard (Ineos Grenadiers) and Stan Dewulf (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale), before Juanpe López (Lidl-Trek) and Michael Valgren (EF Education-EasyPost) also bridged across to make it a breakaway of six in front.

Heading northeast out of the stage 3 finish location in Bama up towards Jinchengjiang, the sprint-focussed teams took control as they did on the opening three stages and gradually cut into the six-man group's lead, which was more than three minutes at its biggest.

This pattern held up until the final categorised climb and the last 50km of racing, with Soudal-QuickStep maintaining their position on the front while working for Magnier's fourth win in as many days. With 40km to go, the break's lead was down to just two minutes.

Lopez was the first of the six to drop as they hit the 3.8km hill that averaged 6.3% gradient, with riders back in the peloton also starting to struggle under the pace set by UAE Team Emirates-XRG. Currie and Dewulf left Valgren and Leonard to be caught back by the peloton, but they didn't last mucc longer and the peloton had soon swallowed up all of the break inside 15km to go.

Narváez made more progress in his GC charge at the second intermediate sprint point, beating Paul Double (Jayco AlUla) to the maximum bonus of three seconds. He'll be the big favourite for Saturday's queen stage 5.

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