Tour de Pologne: Bodnar wins breakaway sprint in Nowy Sacz

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Maciej Bodnar (Tinkoff-Saxo) won stage 4 of the Tour de Pologne ahead of breakaway companions Kamil Zieliński (Poland) and Gatis Smukulis (Katusha). The trio broke away in the early part of the 220km stage to Nowy Sacz and held off the challenge from the peloton.

Zieliński started the day 16 seconds down on overnight leader Marcel Kittel (Giant Alpecin) but the German was distanced on the climbs well before the finish. With the gap over the peloton and the bonus seconds earned, Zieliński moved into the race leader’s jersey. Bodnar sits second at three seconds with Caleb Ewan (Orica GreenEdge) third at 22 seconds.

The Australian led the peloton home, 20 seconds behind the break, which had established a lead of almost 12 minutes on a day dominated by rain.

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The peloton had reduced the break’s lead to 5:25 with 75 kilometres to go and appeared to have the break under control with a bunch sprint on the cards.

When the peloton hit the climb of the Trzetrzewina Team Sky, Lampre and Orica-GreenEdge led the pack. Kittel was an early casualty and despite a brief fightback he was distanced for good.

The break should have been within touching distance as the race headed inside the final 30km but their advantage held at a relatively stable 3:28 as the course reached the first of four laps on a flat finishing circuit.

The chase from the bunch simply wasn’t effective enough and with 20km remaining the leaders – who consistently shared the workload throughout the stage - still had 2:30.

The wet roads on the finishing circuit certainly didn’t help the peloton’s progress, with each corner causing the pace to slow. Etixx-QuickStep moved themselves to the front in a bid to keep their leader Michal Kwiatkowski safe but even with two kilometres to go the leaders still had a sizeable 30-second advantage.

Zieliński could sense that the yellow jersey was his and spurred on as he led his companions towards the line, safe in the knowledge that a yellow jersey would be his, even if the stage win would go to either Smukulis or Bodnar.

And it was the Tinkoff-Saxo rider who opened his sprint to the line first. After such a long effort in the break, the sprint came down to sheer willpower and Smukulis quickly sat up when Bodnar created a winning gap.

Zieliński hung on for second place and the leader’s yellow jersey to give his team the perfect gift in their home race.

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