David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ) claimed victory at the Tour du Jura Cycliste with a rasping attack in the final kilometre of the summit finish at Mont Poupet. It was the Frenchman’s first win since he landed a stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné almost two years ago.
The race was always likely to come down to a skirmish on the short, sharp climb to the finish, and Gaudu proved the strongest at the end of a spirited contest on Mont Poupet. Jordan Jegat (TotalEnergies) made a late surge to claim second place, while Guillaume Martin (Cofidis), so generous in his efforts, had to settle for third.
“It’s been a long time since I raised my arms,” Gaudu said afterwards. “This victory means a lot. I've been struggling pretty much all the time for almost a year now. But now the wheel seem to be turning for me and for the team, so it's really great.”
The race was animated by an early 14-man break, but with Cofidis, Groupama-FDJ and Caja Rural-Seguros RGA among the teams controlling the peloton, there was never any real prospect of the escapees defying the odds here.
Marco Frigo (Israel Premier Tech) and Adne Holder (Uno-X) carried a lead of a minute into the final 15km. Still, the gap shrank steadily on the succession of undulations that led to the bottom of the climb proper, where Kenny Elissonde took up the reins for Cofidis.
Elissonde’s efforts surprisingly put pressure on Lenny Martinez, such an impressive winner at Classic Grand Besançon Doubs on Friday. The 20-year-old lost contact with the front of the race with a shade over 3.5km to go here, though he recovered sufficiently to take 11th place.
Gaudu sprang into action shortly after his young teammate was dropped, accelerating fiercely with 3.4km to go, catching and passing the remaining escapees. Jefferson Cepeda (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) was immediately on his wheel, with Martin and Felix Gall (Decathlon-AG2R) bridging up soon afterwards.
Gall was the next favourite to play his hand, attacking with 3km remaining. Behind, Gaudu now looked in some difficulty, and instead it was Cepeda who managed to fight his way back up to Gall’s wheel.
Martin had looked relatively comfortable on the climb, however, and the Frenchman now set about reeling in Gall and Cepeda. A lull followed his arrival at the front, which allowed Gaudu, Cristian Rodriguez (Arkea-B&B Hotels) and Harm Vanhoucke (Lotto-Dstny) to regain contact with 2km go.
Martin sensed his opportunity shortly afterwards, and his sharp acceleration saw the race take on a new complexion. The group of favourites splintered as they gave chase, with Gaudu and Cepeda battling their way up to Martin a few hundred metres later.
That trio reached the final kilometre together at the head of the race before Gaudu launched what proved to be the winning attack shortly after passing beneath the flamme rouge.
The steepest pitches of Mont Poupet come in the final kilometre and Gaudu betrayed obvious signs of suffering, where Cepeda and Martin almost closed the gap to within touching distance.
On the final ramps, however, Gaudu summoned up another mammoth effort that carried him definitively clear. By the time the road flattened out in the final 300m, he could already sense he was on the cusp of his first win of 2024.
While Gaudu sat up to celebrate his triumph, the chasers scrambled for the podium spots. Jegat’s late effort carried him to second, four seconds down, while Martin took third place ahead of Gall and Vanhoucke.
“Our next objective is to be in good shape for the Ardennes,” Gaudu said. “We'll have a good group there and we'll be going there with confidence. I'm really looking forward to the Flèche Wallonne and Liège-Bastogne-Liège and then the Tour de Romandie. After that, we'll have time to think about the Tour de France.”
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