Tour Down Under 2018: People's Choice Classic

By
published

January 1 - January 21, Wakefield Road, Adelaide, Adelaide, Road - WorldTour

Refresh

Hello and welcome to live coverage from the People's Choice Classic.

 We're in downtown Adelaide, it's Sunday night and it's the pre-event race to the Tour Down Under. 50.6km of racing  - 22 laps and in the end Caleb Ewan wins.

The young Australian has been in fine form once again, and is surely the race favourite for this evening's race. He won last year, and then went on to win four stages of the Tour Down Under. He has the full backing of Mitchelton Scott at the race but there are a few more rivals kicking around who will be looking to spoil the party for the local team.

One of those riders is Germany's Andre Greipel. He has 16 stage wins in the TDU, and and two overall titles. He didn't have his best year in 2017 but is eager to turn the page and win here tonight. We sat down with Greipel a couple of nights ago, and here's our interview. 

We're about 30 mins or so from the official race start but riders are already out there and riding the circuit. It's a pretty straight forward  crit though, with few surprises. 

Breaking news: Spratt has one the Santos Women's Tour - defending her title from last year. Chloe Hosking won the final stage, just moments ago. You can find the report, results and soon photos, just here.

In less important news, Richie Porte went for a swim today. I know this because he told me. 

 

In terms of conditions, they are perfect for this time of year. The sun is slowly setting and there's just a gentle breeze out on the roads. 

Here's the complete start list for today. We're about 15 minutes away from the start of the race. 

Peter Sagan is here too. His team have been hit with illness since arriving here in Australia but in the world champion, Oss, Bennett, Kennaugh and McCarthy they have one of the strongest teams on paper. Here's what Sagan had to say before the race.

Four minutes. Four minutes until the crit starts. Riders are lining up on the start line, and Sagan, Porte and Simon Gerrans are front and centre. 

Here's the Mitchelton Scott team in full. It just screams full leadout doesn't it. Interestingly Ewan is out of contract at the end of the year but surely he'd be mad to leave this team.

And we're about to start. Here we go. I hope you've packed your suitcase of courage because you're going to need it today. Actually, maybe not a full suitcase. I carry-on would probably be enough. Maybe a bum-bag even. 

Bahrain Merida. Who called it? They'e just sent a rider up the road but EF are chasing the move down. We're already lined out on the first lap.

And EF are keeping the move going with a few more riders trying to jump across. 

Now it's Trek who take over at the front and fire a rider up the road. 

Dempter, Bohli, and Beppu are in the break now and they're creating a short gap. The trio have a few seconds but it's going to take  a huge effort to build on this advantage. That said the bunch have sat up and spread out over the road as two more riders try and make the split too.

Dempter, Bohli, and Beppu are in the break now and they're creating a short gap. The trio have a few seconds but it's going to take  a huge effort to build on this advantage. That said the bunch have sat up and spread out over the road as two more riders try and make the split too.

The trio have around 15 seconds at the moment as they're about to be joined by  a rider from Katusha and one from Bahrain. Who will chase? 

These five leader are working well together and i can see them getting 30 seconds pretty quickly if they keep this up. 

At the start our own Zeb Woodpower spoke to Ewan:


 

Lap 4 and the break are holding. Restrepo and Boaro have joined the break. Restrepo is from Colombia and I spoke to him at the Katusha team camp last month. He was tenth on GC at the TDU last year and won the white jersey. He's a decent young talent and will work well with Nathan Haas in this year's race. 

The gap to the break is holding ta 12 seconds. Howson is doing the work on the front of the bunch, with Lotto Soudal sat behind him. Lap 5.

Beppu takes the intermediate sprint. Never in doubt. 

Actually it was Boara. Sorry. It was a doubt. Beppu was second there.

Lap 6. 

Zeb also also spoken to Lancaster from Team Sky. 

And two more riders are coming over. Morton an and Roe but they have a gap to still close. Lap 7.

Porte is at the back as we see the two leading groups link up once more. Bora and Scott are starting to organise the chase with a bit of help from Lotto Soudal. 

The seven leaders are working well as we see De Gendt leading the chase. Lap 8/22.

Another sprinter  to watch is Viviani. Again, we spoke to him earlier in the week about his move from Team Sky to Quick-Step. The story is here.

41 seconds. That's the gap. As we see QuickStep put a man on the front too.

Bora are starting to look a lot more organised as we look back through the peloton. Up ahead and the seven leaders are still swapping turns as Howson moves up and sets the pace for the main field. 

Bora are starting to look a lot more organised as we look back through the peloton. Up ahead and the seven leaders are still swapping turns as Howson moves up and sets the pace for the main field. 

Restrepo takes the second intermediate sprint. He came from a long way back to take the points. 

Onto lap 11 and the gap is holding at around 30 seconds. 

And the break have started to attack each other, already. That's not a great sign at this point in the race. It shows they're not working well together. Restrepo attacked but he's caught. They're talking to each other and the gap drops to 24 seconds.

Team Sky are staring to move up a well. They've a young team here but they have options, such as Bernal, for the GC later in the week. Up ahead the seven leaders have found some cohesion. 

More attacks from the break and it's Restrepo again as he goes for the next prime. He's going to take it. 

And the break splits with Boara, Restrepo and Bohli going clear with 16 laps completed. 

And now Restrepo has been dropped. Just two leaders now as Quick-Step set the pace.

Here's the CN podcast. You can download all our latest editions right now for free. 

And the break have been caught on lap18. Four laps to go. It's Sunweb on the front now as they whip up the speed. The bunch immediately line up as we see Ewan on Hayan's wheel a bit further back.

Sky come over the top and now they're setting the pace. Too far out, surely. 

AG2R. Attack. Attack. 

Sagan, meanwhile, has moved up. Montaguti was the Ag2R rider but he's about to be caught. Lap 19. 

Sunweb again are on the front. 

Astana are now on the front but here come Scott as well as they come through the inside. 

Apologies but we have some technical problems here. 

It appears the live stream has been cut by the TV broadcaster. 

"What is happening?" asks a panicked race organiser. 

We know that there's one lap to go. 

We are hearing on race radio that Sagan has won. We do not have confirmation on that yet though. 

Confirmation now that Sagan has one the race. 

Given the state of the information we're getting, we're going to triple check that for you. Again we apologise for all of this. 

Greipel was second and Ewan was third but confirmation that Sagan has indeed won the race. 

Peter Sagan (Bora-hansgrohe) claimed his first win of the season with victory in the People's Choice Classics in Adelaide. The world champion beat Andre Greipel (Lotto Soudal) and Caleb Ewan (Mitchelton-Scott) to win the race and take his first victory of the campaign.

Again, sincere apologies. We were relying on the broadcaster feed and with two laps to go they decided to cut the feed. 

While we wait for more information on what happened, why not read this piece on Team Sky's new signing Egan Bernal. 

Here's the top 10:

You can find our brief report, photos, and results, right here.

Thanks for joining us today. You can find our complete race report, photos and results, right here.

Latest on Cyclingnews