Caleb Ewan strikes first in Tour Down Under Criterium

Image 1 of 31

Report

Caleb Ewan made a perfect start to his second season with Lotto Soudal, taking his fourth victory in five editions of the Tour Down Under Classic criterium with a convincing sprint in Adelaide, despite rain showers and wet roads affecting the race.

The Australian anticipated and launched his sprint as EF Pro Cycling were leading out Kristoffer Halvorsen. He opened up a considerable margin over the rest, with Elia Viviani coming through to take second place on his debut for Cofidis.

It was Viviani's own lead-out man, Simone Consonni, who held on for the final spot on the podium, finishing ahead of Jasper Philipsen (UAE Team Emirates), Halvorsen, and young Italian Alberto Dainese (Team Sunweb).

Sam Bennett made a disappointing debut for Deceuninck-QuickStep, finding himself too far back in the final straight. He eased up and shook his head, leaving lead-out man Michael Morkov to take seventh, ahead of Australian Criterium champion Sam Welsford, Chris Lawless (Team Ineos), and Giacomo Nizzolo of NTT Pro Cycling. 

"I started this season with a bit of pressure to replicate what I did last year," Ewan said, having won 10 races in 2019, including three stages of the Tour de France. 

"This was my first race of the season - usually I do some races before - but I felt really good out there."

There were some question marks when Ewan was seen at the back of the peloton for much of the race, but he insisted it was a sign of how relaxed he was. With 20 of the 30 laps of the 1.7km circuit covered, he moved up towards the front, as Team Ineos pushed the pace. 

Manuele Boaro (Astana) had been a constant attacking presence from the start, slotting in to a six-man break before trying to go solo from five laps out, but the sprint teams weren't going to make any mistake. The rain grew harder and a small crash with three laps to go split the peloton and sparked tension.

From that point, EF Pro Cycling took control of the race for Halvorsen, but while he was still being led out, Ewan sprang out on the right-hand side of the road to deliver a commanding victory by a few bike lengths. 

"On the last six or seven laps, it started to rain, and that made it a lot more nervous in the bunch," Ewan said. 

"My team did a great job to help me stay in the front through all the fighting for position. Roger [Kluge] left that gap for me in the final straight there and that gave me a really good launching pad."

The six-stage Tour Down Under begins proper on Tuesday with the 150km circuit stage around Tanunda.  

Results