Kittel doubles up on stage 2

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Marcel Kittel (Skil-Shimano) turned on the style to win stage 2 of the Tour of Poland with an empathic sprint finish. He kept his overall lead in the race, beating Heinrich Haussler (Garmin-Cervelo) and Graeme Brown (Rabobank) to the line.

Skil-Shimano controlled the final kilometre with Tom Veelers leading out. Haussler was the first rider to kick out for the line but Kittel powered past and raised his arms with 20 meters to go, so resounding was his sprint.

"Today the team expected to save the yellow jersey and wearing it gave me an extra motivation. When you win, like I did on stage 1 yesterday, you want to win again and you feel a big pressure. The day was pretty easy until we caught the breakaway, then the fight was very harsh for keeping position. My team offered me strong support again, and Tom put me in the perfect position. Tomorrow I heard the finish is after a descent. It will be a very fast sprint and I'm excited," Kittel said at the finish.

While the dash for the line was clinical and decisive, the final 10 kilometres was anything but, with BMC, Liquigas, HTC and Sky all attempting, but failing to stamp their authority on the bunch. The evenly matched leadouts, coupled with a sense of nervousness saw riders collide in the final 3 kilometres, with Alessandro Ballan one of the riders caught up in mass pile up.

Ballan and Omega Pharma-Lotto's Bart De Clerq were not seriously injured, but were taken to the hospital following the incident for examinations. While they did not finish the stage, they will be allowed to start stage 3 if they can, as the fall came inside the protected final 3km.

The early action was marked by a four-man move that built up a lead of over two minutes. It included three riders from yesterday's main break, with Pierre Cazaux (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Adrian Kurek (Poland) and Bartlomiej Matysiak (CCC Polsat Polkowice) being joined by new-comer Paolo Bailetti (De Rosa - Ceramica Flaminia).

Despite working well together there was clear intent on Kurek's part: he made off with enough bonus seconds to ensure that if he finished within the main field and Kittel finished outside of the top three then the lead would pass to the Polsat rider.

As the bunch hit the finishing circuit, which they would compete four times, Liquigas and BMC set their men to the front in order to reduce the gap. The leaders were no match for the bunch, no matter how disorganised the chase appeared at times, and they were caught within the final 10 kilometers.

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