Alberto Dainese (Tudor Pro Cycling) notched up his first win of the 2024 season, out-sprinting Marijn van den Berg (EF Education-EasyPost) and Sam Bennett (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) at the end of the 159.9 stage from Segré-en-Anjou Bleu to Château-Gontier-sur-Mayenne.
A five-rider breakaway formed in the first hour Fredrik Dversnes (Uno-X Mobility), Hugo Aznar (Kern Pharma), Leo Danês(CIC U Nantes Atlantique), Damien Girard (Nice Metropole Côte d’Azur), Romain Cardis (St Michel-Mavic-Auber ‘93)
After Aznar threw in the towel in the final hour, the remainder of the breakaway was brought back with 17 kilometres to go.
More attacks followed by Arkéa-B&B Hotels were intent on bringing the stage down to a sprint. Attacks by Rodrigo Álvarez (Burgos BH) and then Sam Watson (Groupama-FDJ) were quickly neutralised.
Ben Healy delivered a powerful lead-out for his EF Education-EasyPost teammate heading into the final kilometre with Bryan Coquard (Cofidis) on the wheel but Dainese came around the outside and denied them both, with Bennett snatching third place with a bike throw.
Results
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'Losing a couple of seconds every corner was not nice, but Mathieu was the strongest, so we don't really have the feeling that we missed out on a title or anything'
