Paris-Nice: Cimolai wins stage 5 in Rasteau

Davide Cimolai of Lampre-Merida won stage 5 of Paris-Nice, ahead of Bryan Coquard (Europcar) and Michael Matthews (Orica-GreenEdge). The peloton caught the last member of the day’s break, Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal), within sight of the finish line. There was no change in the general classification.

De Gendt broke away on the day’s first and hardest climb, the Col de la Republique. He was joined by Andrew Talansky (Cannondale-Garmin), Romain Sicard (Europcar), Egor Silin and Pawel Poljanski (Tinkoff-Saxo). De Gendt, already King of the Mountains, picked up the maximum number of points at each of the four climbs.

However, the field never let the break enjoy more than four minutes, with Talansky still a GC threat, although De Gendt was able to pick up points on the  Col du Deves and every other climb on the stage.

With 60 km to go, Cofidis moved up to help Etixx-QuickStep with the chase work, and the gap started to drop. Again, De Gendt led the small group over the Cote de l’Aylerac, but the gap kept getting smaller, hovering around the three minute mark.

The peloton kept grinding away and with 20 km to go, the gap was 1:30. Bradley Wiggins (Sky) moved to the front with the gap at one minute and 15 km to go. He was closely followed by his teammates as a number of GC contenders vied for position ahead of the final climb of the stage. The sprinters’ team were also present, with this their final chance for glory before the end of the race.

De Gendt had been the driving force behind the break, and he fought hard to stay away. He led all the way up the final climb, hoping to get the maximum number of points on the day, as meanwhile Wiggins dropped off the back of the field, having done his job of helping to close the gap.

He was not the only one to fall back, as BMC headed up the chase at a high speed. Sicard and Poljanski dropped out of the lead group. The remaining three took 25 seconds into the final five kilometres, when De Gendt turned on the gas yet again, dropping Talansky.

The gap went up to 30 seconds with 3km to go, and the field turned the speed up, with a number of sprinters still in the group. De Gendt pulled away from Silin at the flamme rouge, but the peloton was thundering along. The Belgian was caught close to the finish, with only a few hundred meters left.

Just as the Lotto rider was swamped, Coquard jumped from the peloton and created a slight gap. Only Cimolai and Matthews could track the Europcar rider but just before the line the Lampre sprinter came around Coquard’s right to take the biggest win of his career.

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