Tour of Alberta: Slagter wins in Miette Hot Springs

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Tom-Jelte Slagter (Cannondale-Garmin) won the first of two newly introduced summit finishes at the Tour of Alberta, during stage 3 in Miette Hot Springs located in the Jasper National Park. The Dutchman made his winning move following a series of attacks within in the last kilometre and finished just ahead of Bauke Mollema (Trek Factory Racing), who was closing in on his compatriot in the last hundred metres but ran out of road to narrowly miss the win. Adam Yates (Orica-GreenEdge) placed third on the day. 

"We looked in the book and we knew that today would be good for me," Slagter said. "We tried our best and we won it. We knew that it would be hard in the finish. I think at one kilometre to go there were only three guys in front of me and everyone looked around, everyone was tired. With 500 metres to go, I thought that was the moment to go. I was looking at the others and I thought that everyone was at their limit, so that was the best moment for me to go.

"It’s always nice racing with a victory in the pocket because that pressure is gone. Tomorrow will be full on again."

Mollema moved back into the overall race lead by six seconds ahead of Yates and 20 seconds ahead of Sergey Lagutin (Team Katusha). He had taken the first leader’s jersey following Trek Factory Racing’s win in the stage 1 team time trial but lost it to Michael Matthews (Orica-GreenEdge), who won stage 2 in Grande Prairie.

The Tour of Alberta will continue on Saturday with the stage 4 circuit race held inside Jasper National Park. The race will end with the second summit finish of the event, at the Marmot Basin Ski Area, which includes a 12km ascent that finishes at more than 1,600 metres of elevation.

How it unfolded

The third stage of the Tour of Alberta offered the peloton a 181km race from Grande Cache to the first summit finish in Jasper National Park at the Miette Hot Springs.

The forecast called for overnight snow in Grande Cache but the riders instead lined up under light rain and temperatures hovering the freezing mark. As the race progressed along the stretch on Hwy 40, remnants of the night’s snowfall remained on the sides of the roads and treetops.

An early breakaway set off that included Jasper Bovenhuis (Cannondale-Garmin), Alex Cataford (Silber Pro Cycling), Tom Zirbel (Optum Pro Cycling) and Thomas Vaubourzeix (Lupus Racing) along with KOM leader Ben Perry (Silber Pro Cycling) and Cesar Benedetti (Bora-Argon 18), who were in the breakaway during stage 2. The breakaway held a three-minute lead with 65km to go. Adam de Vos (H&R Block) was also in the original breakaway but was forced to stop at the side of the road due to a mechanical.

Orica-GreenEdge led the main field with stage 2 winner Michael Matthews wearing the overall leader’s jersey sitting in the field. The team was, however, working for their main climber Adam Yates and support climber Christian Meier.

As the breakaway approached the first KOM on course at the 125km mark a the Hinton Nordic Park, Perry was the first to launch his attack but was passed by Benedetti at the line.

The breakaway continued on along Hwy 40’s undulating terrain as their gap dropped to 1:45 with roughly 30km to go. They turned onto Hwy 16 and crossed through the Jasper National Park gate at the base of the final climb up Miette Rd.

Zirbel and Bovenhuis attacked and cleared their breakaway companions while the main field took chunks out of the gap, reducing it to under 10 seconds. Bovenhuis made another attack to get rid of Zirbel, with success, however the main field were hot on his heels.

On the climb, it was Trek Factory Racing setting the fast speeds at the front of the peloton for their climber Mollema. As the peloton worked their way up the initial slopes, Mollema’s teammate Laurent Didier made an attack. There was no response from the riders behind, and Orica-GreenEdge stuck together in pursuit with Yates on their wheels.

Nate Brown (Cannondale-Garmin) and Kyle Murphy (Lupus Racing) bridged across to Didier. The second and final KOM of the day came with 12km to go, and Didier picked up full points over the first main peak of the final climb.

The breakaway trio descended out front but the field of roughly 50 riders was all back together ahead of the final five kilometres. Orica-GreenEdge, Katusha and Trek Factory Racing drag raced each other at the start of the final jaunt up hill.

Gaps started to open with one kilometre to go and attacks came from Mollema and then Michael Woods (Optum Pro Cycling). The Canadian was brought back by Slagter, who approached the final 200 metres to win at the Miette Hot Springs, narrowly holding off Mollema.

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