Tour de Suisse: Costa relegated, Kron wins stage 6

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Andreas Kron (Lotto Soudal) didn’t cross the line first on stage 6 of the Tour de Suisse but nevertheless walked away with the victory as Rui Costa (UAE Team Emirates) was deemed to have impeded him in the three-up breakaway sprint.

Kron waved his arm in remonstration as he crossed the line, unhappy with the way Costa moved to the left inside the final 100 metres of a chaotic mountain stage.

Race officials then reviewed the footage and deemed that Costa had deviated from his line, handing victory instead to Kron.

Hermann Pernsteiner (Bahrain Victorious), who created the final three-man selection from an unruly breakaway, led out the sprint but faded quickly and settled for third place.

Despite a frenetic start that saw Julian Alaphilippe (Deceuninck-QuickStep), fourth overall, attack up the road on the early Gotthard Pass, it was ultimately a quiet day in the battle for the overall title, with Richard Carapaz (Ineos Grenadiers) retaining the yellow jersey with two stages remaining.

On a stage that had to be toned down due to snow on the high mountain-tops, the Gotthard Pass was followed by a long descent into the valley before the long Lukmanier Pass, its descent, and a much shallower 10km climb to the line in Sedrun.

After Alaphilippe, whose presence doomed the small early breakaway, sat up half-way through the stage, the floodgates opened and more than 40 riders went up the road in various groups.

Costa was among them but it was his teammate, David De la Cruz, who launched a brave long-range bid for glory. He attacked early on the Lukmanier Pass and crested it with a lead of 1:20 over a reduced chasing group, but faded quickly on the final drag. He was caught with 6.5km to go as Costa jumped aboard Pernsteiner’s attack, with Kron bridging across to make it a trio.

They just about ensured a chase group of Neilson Powless (EF Education-Nippo), Gonzalo Serrano (Movistar), Pierre Latour (Total Direct Energie), Antwan Tolhoek (Jumbo-Visma), and Hugo Houle (Astana-Premier Tech) were unable to make contact inside the final kilometre and settled it in a three-up sprint.

Pernsteiner, the weakest sprinter of the three, had tried one final attack with 2km to go but was then resigned to sealing a podium position and led out after a brief game of cat and mouse.

Costa hit the front with 200 metres, closely tracked by Kron, who looked to move alongside on the left, just as the Portuguese was moving that way – a move that was deemed dangerous by the officials and which gave the stage a final twist beyond the finish line.

In the end, 19 riders survived from the breakaway before the 30-rider bunch came home at 2:49. There was no change at the top of the general classification but sixth-placed Lucas Hamilton dropped out of the race as four BikeExchange riders abandoned with stomach problems. Meanwhile, Costa moved up 12 places into 10th, closely followed by Serrano and Latour.

How it unfolded

The peloton was six riders light as it rolled out of Andermatt, with Luke Durbridge, Jack Bauer, and Amund Grondahl Jansen the other BikeExchange riders to leave the race with gastroenteritis. There was another high-profile absentee in double-stage winner and former race leader Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix), who was suffering from a ‘mild cold’, and Simon Pellaud (Swiss national team), who was struggling after his efforts at the Giro d’Italia.

There was no gentle introduction to the short 130km stage, as the road climbed from the flag up the northern side of the Gotthard Pass (8.5km at 7.2 per cent). World Champion Julian Alaphilippe, fourth overall at the start of the day, lit the fireworks by going on the offensive. He was part of a large breakaway group that threatened to form, before managing to stay clear in a much smaller group. With him for support was his teammate, Mattia Cattaneo, and the pair were soon joined by Marc Soler (Movistar), who lost 20 minutes on the previous stage, and later by Antonio Nibali (Trek-Segafredo).

Towards the top of the climb, the chasing bunch had been reduced to the point it could barely be called a peloton, with Max Schachmann (Bora-Hansgrohe), third overall at the start of the day, a surprise struggler. Although Cattaneo had to battle to stay in contact, the front group crested the Gotthard Pass with 121km to go with a lead of 45 seconds. A six-man counter-attack went clear towards the top but was soon brought back and the peloton, including Schachmann, started to reform on the descent.

With Alaphilippe such a threat, Ineos Grenadiers and UAE Team Emirates kept a solid pace on the descent, which then levelled out into a much gentler pedalling downhill towards the valley floor. There was disorganization all over the road, with a couple of crashes slowing the peloton, while up front Nibali was dropped briefly, and Alaphilippe appeared to sit up and consider knocking off his effort before pressing on again.

The gap came down to 30 seconds but then rose to a minute with 100km to go and stayed that way for the rest of the downhill. When the road started to tilt uphill again with 70km to go, it was clear Alaphilippe’s presence in the break was an unsolvable problem, and so the world champion sat up and waited for the peloton.

With the gap still at a minute to the now-three-man breakaway, and with a long drag up to the Lukmanier Pass, more riders were inspired to go on the attack. As many as 30 managed to clip off the front and make their way over to the front of the race, before the bunch exploded into numerous different groups, with at least four counter-attacks on the road.

With 50km to go, just ahead of the start of the Lukmanier Pass – 18km at 5.6 per cent – the breakaway had swelled to 40, with other riders still chasing. After Michael Matthews (Team BikeExchange) won the intermediate sprint, they started the climb with a lead of two minutes over what was left of the peloton.

Andreas Kron (Lotto Soudal) was the first to attack on the climb itself but was soon brought to heel, while Søren Kragh Andersen (Team DSM) was the next to go, but was caught and passed by David De la Cruz (UAE Team Emirates), who embarked on a solo bid for glory. Back in the peloton, where 60 riders remained, Ineos Grenadiers controlled the pace, setting a steady tempo through Pavel Sivakov that saw the gap rise to three minutes.

Andreas Leknessund (Team DSM) then set off in pursuit of De la Cruz, but was caught 7km from the summit by more chasers in Matteo Fabbro (Bora-Hansgrohe), Antwan Tolhoek (Jumbo-Visma), Pernsteiner, and Costa. Neilson Powless (EF Education-Nippo) was dangling several metres behind them as the group continued to lose time to De la Cruz, now 55 seconds out front.

Two kilometres up the road, the chase group swelled, with the Movistar duo of Gonzalo Serrano and Sergio Samitier dragging their way across, along with Kron, Marc Hirschi (UAE Team Emirates), Mauri Vansevenant (Deceuninck-QuickStep), Pierre Latour (Total Direct Energie), Omar Fraile (Astana-Premier Tech), and Fred Wright (Bahrain Victorious). Almost immediately, with De la Cruz moving out to over a minute, Leknessund went on the attack again, sparking another shake-up in the chase.

With 29km to go, De la Cruz reached the summit of the Lukmanier Pass with a lead of 1:20 over late-attacker Powless, with the rest of that chase group a few seconds further back. Sivakov led the peloton all the way to the top, by which point there were fewer than 40 riders left and the gap to De la Cruz stood at four minutes.

The subsequent 18km descent was a relatively gentle one, with plenty of pedalling sections, and De la Cruz started to lose ground, while the chase group swelled as Matthews, Kyle Murphy (Rally Cycling) and Hugo Houle (Astana-Premier Tech) worked their way back in. By the foot of the descent, with 10km to go, De le Cruz led the chasers by 45 seconds, with the peloton having come back to three minutes.

The road then kicked uphill for a short third-category climb - 1.2km at 5.1 per cent – before continuing to rise all the way to the line at an average of 3.5 per cent. That’s where De la Cruz suddenly started to fade. He was alone over the top of the categorized climb but soon dropped to 25 seconds on the uncategorized section as riders tried to force a selection in the chase.

After a split had come back together, Fabbro attacked with 8km to go and stretched it out once more. De la Cruz remained out front to take the second intermediate sprint but his lead was reduced to 10 seconds. With 6.3km to go, he looked around and saw his teammate Rui Costa coming across with Pernsteiner. He couldn’t hang on for long, and fell away as Kron chased down the two new leaders to make it three out front with 5km to go.

Behind them, Serrano, Powless, Latour, Tolhoek, and Houle formed a leading five-man chase, riding at 16 seconds with 3.5km to go. Just 500 metres later, Powless launched an attack but couldn’t split the group as Houle responded and Tolhoek dragged the others back.

With 2km to go, sensing his weakness as a sprinter, Pernsteiner launched an attack out front but couldn’t shake Costa or Kron. Behind, Tokhoek attacked, with Houle once again responding quickly before the group came back together with a kilometre remaining.

At that point, the front three started to look around at each other, playing cat and mouse, allowing the chasers to close in. Pernsteiner then took it up with 400 metres to go, before Costa launched the sprint proper with 200 metres to go. He crossed the line first but it was Kron who’d be ushered up to the podium ceremony.