Haas fires on Arthurs seat beating Bobridge, and sealing overall honours

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They call him the 'Haassassin' and on today's fourth stage of the Jayco Herald Sun Tour, Nathan Haas out-climbed his general classification rivals including national road champion Jack Bobridge to claim the overall lead heading into Sunday's final stage in Carlton.

The Genesys Wealth Advisers' Australian domestic sensation crossed the finish line on Arthurs Seat on Victoria's Mornington Peninsula in second, behind stage winner Russian Igor Silin (Katusha), but importantly had gained enough time on race leader Rhys Pollock (Drapac) to snatch the yellow jersey.

Pollock, finished 35th for the stage, 1:39 down on Silin, but lost time on the final of three laps up Arthurs Seat leaving it to Haas and Bobridge to battle it out over the final two kilometres. It was a milestone victory for Silin – his first as a professional.

"I am very happy," he said.

"The finish was very nice for me as I climbed very well. I thank my team - they did a very good job."

Silin had taken his cue from Omega Pharma-Lotto's Adam Hansen who continued his trend of launching an attack in the final kilometres of the race as he has several times already this week, but the Russian sat on the Australian's wheel just long enough before moving ahead and never looking back.

If Silin was indeed very happy, Haas was a picture of ecstasy and disbelief, visibly emotional about just what he had achieved. Haas is the current leader of Australia's National Road Series having claimed overall victories in five multi-stage tours, his most recent the previous Sunday at the Tour of Tasmania but today's achievement is easily the pinnacle of his bourgeoning career.

"To come up against someone that I've admired since I was a junior like Bobridge or any of these guys that are in this race, you know this is a little bit of a dream at the moment," Haas told reporters. "I still can't believe what's happening."

Haas' cycling background is in mountain biking having taken the sport up to rehabilitate a knee injury while playing AFL. In 2007, the now Canberra-based rider finished second in the cross-country discipline at the national championships and then fifth the following year in the under 23 category. It was experience which really paid off on the Sun Tour's queen stage, as he went on to explain:

"Coming onto this climb - coming from a mountain bike background - I really like short, steep stuff and lots of switchbacks and lots of different acceleration movements so I always knew it was going to be a really good climb for me if I had the legs that I dreamt of and I did."

Haas had gone into Saturday's stage in a three-man race for the overall, with leader from Stage 1 and beyond Pollock, and Bobridge (Garmin-Cervelo). With the battle down to two, Bobridge did his best to stay with the Genesys rider but was unable to make up any ground once Haas moved ahead.

"I gave it everything I had and I couldn't get rid of him, he was way too strong - he's a classy bike rider," Bobridge said.

"It's only a matter of time before he steps up and goes somewhere bigger."

How it unfolded:

Stijn van den Bergh (Katusha) was again off to an aggressive start as the peloton left the upmarket holiday town of Sorrento behind, dashing off the front of the bunch for a brief solo escape before being joined by Pat Shaw (Genesys), Glen Chadwick (Pure Black), Cam Peterson (V Australia) and John Anderson (Australian National Team) who made it to the break for the second day running. By the 36 kilometre mark, the five had built a gap of 3:06 over the peloton who were waiting to pounce with three laps of Arthurs Seat all consuming.

As Genesys had planned, Shaw – squarely in the mould of super domestique for the Tasmanian-based outfit – set the tone for the day, and claimed first points on the day's opening KOM at the top of the first lap over the climb. As the peloton picked up the pressure on the chase, the escape's lead was cut to 2:51.

Not content to give up the yellow jersey without a fight, Pollock's Drapac team moved to the front of the bunch on the decent but the lead had gone back out to 3:06, then increased to nearly four minutes as the race hit the 50 kilometre mark.

Thirteen kilometres later at the day's first sprint point at Merricks, the breakaway's lead was out by another minute with a determined and protective Shaw again first over the line, followed by van den Bergh and Chadwick, putting the Belgian Katusha rider just two points behind sprint classification leader, Haas. Shaw's hard work proved to be in vain, for now, at the second sprint point with van den Bergh claiming maximum points, and moving ahead of Haas by just one point.

The trains of Saxo Bank – SunGard and Drapac maintained their positions at the front of the bunch, gradually bringing the gap down to 3:18 after 87 kilometres of racing but with Garmin-Cervelo also lending a hand in the hope of getting Bobridge into position to contest GC, the break was eventually swallowed on the second ascent.

"We were trying to put someone in the break early, just in case on the second last climb an escape were to win and we'd have Pat up the road," Genesys team manager Andrew Christie-Johnson told Cyclingnews after the race. "He didn't quite make over the second climb but he tacked back on to the second bunch and it came back together. The boys have just been exceptional in their teamwork all year – that's how we get results.

Cheered on by thousands of fans lining the road up Arthurs Seat despite the wet and extremely blustery conditions V Australia's Cam Peterson, fresh off his challenge to Haas at the Tour of Tasmania, was the first to have a go off the front, while Matt Lloyd (Australian National Team) did his best to put a dint on the race – something he had openly placed on the agenda all week.

"To be honest, it was quite pleasing - there was no real way to get the top end that you need, especially to go up a climb like that, in four days [of racing], the 2010 Giro d'Italia King of the Mountains classification winner said following the stage.

Lloyd was third over the KOM point behind Peterson and Cameron Meyer (Garmin-Cervelo).

"Having not raced for nine months, I can't really complain about it too much.” Lloyd would later be dropped from the front group on the final climb to finish 18th and 39 seconds in arrears.

Within the bunch, Haas was feeling reasonably comfortable sitting safely in around third wheel, as he later revealed.

"To be honest the second time up this climb I felt like I was on an escalator," he said. "I was just sitting behind Bobridge, his body language was starting to get a bit negative and I just started to feel these really nice sensations in my legs."

Meantime, Pollock was going backwards as the battle of three became a duel with attacks of Hansen followed and then bettered by Stilin inconsequential to the battle for overall honours heading into Sunday's final stage.

"I had the legs, I just didn't have enough to get rid of Haas."

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