Von Hoff holds off Jackson by one second in thriller

Last year's Tour de Timor winner Neil Van der Ploeg won day 4 of the 2010 Tour de Timor Ride for Peace in a time of 2:39:57, as yellow jersey Adrian Jackson "AJ" crashed and lost a crucial 31 seconds to come in third.

Jackson (2:40:28) was not badly hurt in the crash but suffered extensive gravel rash, cuts and bruising.

Steele von Hoff followed his teammate Van der Ploeg across the line in 2:39:58 and second place. Ben Mather, who has been sacrificing his own position to help Jackson, was fourth in 2:40:36. Van der Ploeg and von Hoff said they both had run tyres on low pressure to handle the slippery tar surfaces.

The result sets up a fascinating final stage with either von Hoff or Jackson the likely winner of the tour.

Hundreds of school children and locals waving flags lined the finish sprint in a magnificent spectacle. A five-metre crocodile in a wire pen just a few metres from the finish seemed unfazed by the celebrations.

Once again Row Fry was the first female over the line in 3:06:46 and retains the pink jersey. She had a 30-minute lead at the start of this stage, and it is hard to imagine any of the other women catching her. Fry looks set to maintain her reputation as the best female mountain biker that Australia has to offer.

"I took it fairly easy," Fry said, "there is no reason to take risks."

Fry is in the same team as AJ and Mather and said it would be hard to make time on the downhills and flats.

Today's stage peaked at just over 1900 metres with a 20-kilometre climb to the top. The surface is relatively smooth tar, again with huge potholes and a few steep pinches. At the top of the highest climb, the road is smooth and fast, levelling out to pass through alpine meadows, similar to some of the higher Tour de France mountain top finishes. After Maubisse, the racers launched into two more tar climbs followed by seriously fun and fast tar descents into the town of Aileu.

Heavy rain late yesterday and into the evening ensured that potholes on the track from Ainaro to Aileu were full of water with some sections also under water. This made it very difficult for riders to judge the hole depths.

"It was really a bit of bad luck for AJ. He had a bingle on the last descent, and then Steele and I just clocked off as hard as we could," Van der Ploeg said. "That was the plan. It worked pretty good.

"It was a bit unfortunate to win in that way with AJ crashing."

As he was receiving medical treatment, Jackson said, "Someone decided to attack on the descent and it was incredibly slippery. We had decided to be careful on the slippery sections - and it had just started raining.

"The crash was nothing serious, just a loss of time and blood everywhere."

About 40 bikes were serviced overnight with only one serious mechanical. Day 1 on the Dili to Balibo stage a rider crashed and dented the frame of his bike. Yesterday he hit a deep pot hole with the inevitable result - a collapsed frame.

Race note

Agusta Doutel is a local palm wine seller. She is 32, married and lives in a rural village in the Aileu district. Agusta is a beneficiary of Timor-Leste's microfinance program. She has seven children aged 3-17 who attend the local school. Her husband Domingos makes 25-30 litres of palm wine a day to sell on the main road and for the Aileu market. They make around $10 - $15 a day, a successful business as there are many travellers on the main road. She is borrowing money from Moris Rasik to expand the business by buying wine from her neighbour and improving her living conditions.

Full Results for Day 4

General classification after day 4

Not available.