Lars Boom (Rabobank) beat Mark Cavendish (Sky) to take a fine win on stage three of the Ster ZLM Toer, but the world champion retains his overall lead at the end of a tough day of racing in the Ardennes.

On the slightly uphill finish at La Gileppe, Boom timed his effort to perfection to power off the front of the peloton. Try as he might, Cavendish was unable to get back on terms with the Dutchman, but he can take solace from the fact that he was still in contention at the end of such a trying day.

The hilly stage saw a number of the fastmen lose touch, including Cavendish’s closest overnight rivals, André Greipel (Lotto Belisol) and Mark Renshaw (Rabobank), and a cursory glance at the top 10 shows that it was not a finale conducive to a pure sprint.

“It was a tough, tough finish but the guys did great and Mark now has eight seconds in hand of Boom going into what's a pan-flat final stage so that's a good position to be in," said Sky directeur sportif Steven de Jongh.

The stage was animated by a break featuring Dion Beukeboom (De Rijke), Marco Haller (Katusha), Jaroslaw Marycz (Saxo Bank) and Nélson Oliveira (RadioShack-Nissan), and that quartet received significant reinforcements when RadioShack-Nissan’s Jan Bakelants and Ben Hermans managed to bridge across after attacking on La Redoute.

On the finishing circuit, however, Sky hit the front of the peloton and succeeded in reeling in the escapees in order to defend Cavendish’s overall lead, even if the Manxman had to give best to Boom on the testing approach to the line.

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