Tour Down Under: Impey twists the Corkscrew for stage 4 win

Daryl Impey (Mitchelton-Scott) won stage 4 of the Tour Down Under in Campbelltown on Friday after the reduced bunch pulled back a dangerous breakaway that escaped on the Corkscrew climb less than 6km from the finish. Impey came from the back of the group in the finishing straight to overtake race leader Patrick Bevin (CCC Team) and Luis Leon Sanchez (Astana) well ahead of the line.

Bevin, who held on for second ahead of Sanchez, continues to lead the general classification, but Impey moved into second place at just seven seconds, with Sanchez now third, 11 seconds back.

The sprint from a reduced group of about 20 riders came after Bevin pulled back a late escape by Michael Woods (EF Education First), George Bennett (Jumbo-Visma), Richie Porte (Trek-Segafredo) and Wout Poels (Team Sky) that went clear on the Corkscrew climb. Bevin railed the descent to the finish and made contact with the front group with 2km remaining.

In the final kilometre, Sanchez came through a right-hand corner with about 800 metres to go in the lead, but was quickly overtaken by Bevin, who appeared to be sprinting to another stage win. It was an initially ill-positioned Impey, however, who had the quickest final surge as Bevin began to fade, giving the defending champion the stage victory.

"We knew that it was going to be hard, but it's fantastic to win today," Impey said. "The guys put their faith in me. Luke [Durbridge] did a massive job there at the beginning. The other guys were looking after me, and Lucas Hamilton rode like a true professional at the end.

"I knew Bevin would have a good shot at winning, so I'm super happy to win today. To be honest, I had a good mate who passed away in early January. I had him in my mind, and I dedicate this victory to him. I was really pushing for him at the end. It's such a special win," he said.

Despite losing time to Impey due to the time bonuses awarded at the finish, Bevin heads into Saturday's fifth stage with the confidence of a still-seven-second buffer.

"This race is hard," the New Zealander told the press after collecting another ochre leader's jersey. "I took the onus as much as I had to on the descent, and I knew that as the group got bigger, it got to the point where any time bonus would be good, and certainly better than none.

"I wasn't going to risk losing time to anyone," said Bevin. "To lose just four seconds to Daryl is a great result. I don't feel like he's climbing better than I am, and we put time into the pure climbers again."

Chasing the break

Before the hoped-for fireworks began on the Corkscrew, six riders had spent the day away in a breakaway, and were still trying to hang on to their slim advantage as the final climb began, inside the last 10km of the 129.2km stage from Unley to Campbelltown.

Thomas De Gendt (Lotto Soudal), Hermann Pernsteiner (Bahrain-Merida), AG2R La Mondiale's Benoit Cosnefroy, Miles Scotson (Groupama-FDJ, UniSA-Australia's Nick White and Jasha Sütterlin (Movistar) escaped almost from the gun, building up a healthy lead that peaked at just over five minutes with 50km of the stage covered.

With temperatures in the high 20s (degrees Centigrade) – rather than the low 40s that have so far plagued the race – and even some rain midway through the stage, the breakaway was willing to race hard. But Bevin and his CCC team ensured that the six riders were kept in check, with the lead tumbling to under two minutes going into the final 30 kilometres.

Up front, and with the breakaway's lead continuing to drop, Scotson took advantage of a slight rise to force the pace, knowing that they'd need to maintain a considerable advantage before the final climb began, although his acceleration quickly put White, Cosnefroy and De Gendt in trouble.

Scotson, Pernsteiner and Sütterlin pushed on alone on the downhill run to the start of Corkscrew, and hit the climb with an advantage of well under a minute on the chasing bunch. Led by a three-man Sky train, it wasn't long before Cosnefroy, De Gendt and White's day was over – soon followed by the catch of Scotson and Sütterlin.

As contact with Pernsteiner was made around a kilometre from the top of Corkscrew, Sky's designated leader, Poels, attacked, and was followed by Porte, Bennett and Woods, and it was that quartet that crested the climb with a slim advantage over the chasers as they plunged down the descent with six kilometres to go – all downhill to the finish.

However, the 20-strong group – which included Bevin, Impey, Sanchez, Rohan Dennis (Bahrain-Merida) and Chris Hamilton (Team Sunweb) – made contact with just two kilometres to go, and the overall favourites readied themselves for a sprint, in which Impey's dominance was never really in doubt. Bevin and Sanchez's second and third places, meanwhile, with the bonus seconds that come with them, could now prove vital.

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