Tour Down Under: Nizzolo wins stage 5 sprint in Victor Harbor

Image 1 of 40

Giacomo Nizzolo (NTT Pro Cycling) took out the bunch sprint victory during stage 5 of the Tour Down Under on Saturday, but it was Daryl Impey (Mitchelton-Scott) who grabbed the top prize of the ochre leader's jersey after the 2019 champion finished second and first at the day's two intermediate sprints and collected enough time  bonuses to jump ahead of overnight race leader Richie Porte (Trek-Segafredo) by two seconds.

Nizzolo scored the first win for his newly branded NTT team by relying on his teammates to both bring him back after a late climb and then drop him off in the perfect position in Victor Harbor to charge up the right-hand side of the road and easily hold of all challengers.

Nizzolo's fellow Italian, Simone Consonni (Cofidis), was second, followed by stage 1 winner Sam Bennett (Deceuninck-QuickStep) and Bennett's lead-out man Michael Mørkøv. Sprint classification leader Jasper Philipsen (UAE Team Emirates) was fifth.

"I can't thank my teammates enough. They did a great, great job," Nizzolo said in Victor Harbor. "That was the plan, that if I was a bit off they would come back and wait for me on the climb. They did it perfectly, and then they did a perfect lead-out as well. I was in the perfect place, and then I just put everything I had through the pedals. It worked in the end, so I'm so happy."

Impey now leads Porte in the general classification by two seconds, with Rob Power (Team Sunweb) in third at nine seconds. Simon Yates (Mitchelton-Scott) is fourth at 13 seconds, and George Bennett (Jumbo-Visma) remains in fifth place at 16 seconds back.

How it unfolded

The 149.km fifth stage from Glenelg to Victor Harbor is similar to other routes that have been used at the Tour Down Under, with a final climb 20km from the finish making it a difficult-but-doable duty for the sprinters.

With the important time bonuses once again in play early, Impey's team drilled back anyone who tried to go up the road save for one lone Frenchman, Axel Domont of AG2R La Mondiale, who Mitchelton-Scott pulled back with plenty of time for the teams to line up for the first sprint at 33.9km.

Mads Pedersen played the perfect teammate for Porte and took the top bonus there, pushing Impey into second and a two-second bonus. But that was good enough for the Mitchelton rider to pull within one second of Porte.

Mitchelton-Scott then went to work again keeping things welded together to give Impey another shot at the second intermediate sprint, which came at 56km in the town of Meadows. This time the versatile South African beat sprint classification leader Jasper Philipsen (UAE Team Emirates) into second to take the three-second bonus and move two seconds ahead of Porte, whose teammate Pedersen got third.

From there the only plumb to be picked on the stage, aside from the finish, was the single KOM on Kerby Hill up Crow's Nest Road in Port Elliot. The 2.9km category 2 climb averaged a 5.9% gradient, and Mitchelton-Scott also had plans for that section.

Before the race could get there, however, a breakaway of four riders formed that included Pedersen (Trek-Segafredo), Josef Cerny (CCC Team), Ian Stannard (Team Ineos) and Ide Schelling (Bora-Hansgrohe).

Cerny started the day 1:59 off the overall lead and was quickly virtual leader on the road as the quartet's advantage went up to over two minutes. That was about as much as the peloton was willing to give the escapees, however, and their advantage languished there for some time. As the KOM approached, the gap started to come down precipitously.

Indeed, with teams fighting for position ahead the climb, the accelerations brought the leaders back at the bottom of the climb and the general classification fireworks started to ignite from there. 

Astana came forward, and, along with MItchelton-Scott, set a pace that started to dismantle the field. Mitchelton had hoped to shed the fastmen so that Impey could have a chance at the stage win and collect another 10-second bonus, giving him a larger cushion over Porte before Sunday's final stage and its Willunga Hill summit finish. Mitchelton-Scott's plan almost worked.

As the field began to splinter and sprinters began to shed out the back at the hands of Mitchelton's pace, a select group of GC riders started to form at the front. Impey, Porte, Power, Simon Yates (Mitchelton-Scott), George Bennett (Jumbo-Visma) and Rohan Dennis (Team Ineos) were all there.

With Porte sitting on, Impey and several riders pressed the pace and tried to prevent the sprinters from coming back in the chase group that had quickly formed when the chaos of the climb subsided.

The sprinters, with massive efforts from their teammates, made contact with the leaders with around six kilometres to go, and after a momentary lull in which Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) attacked, the lead-out trains started to assemble for the final rush to the line.

Results

General classification