Tour of Alberta: Cannondale goes one-two in Edmonton with Howes and Wippert

Alex Howes won the Tour of Alberta’s third stage on Sunday in Edmonton, slipping off the front in the final 150 metres while leading out stage 2 winner Wouter Wippert, who followed him across the line for a Cannondale-Drapac one-two finish. Rally Cycling's Colin Joyce was third.

Evan Huffman (Rally Cycling) finished safely in the field to hold onto his leader's jersey going into Monday's final stage.

The green argyle team followed Wippert's win the day before with another impressive finish-line performance, shutting down Holowesk-Citadel and UnitedHealthcare as the sprint teams pressed the pace to the line.

"We wanted to make it an aggressive race, kind of beating up on Rally a little bit early, and then we managed to miss the break and had to ride," Howes said. "We knew that Wouter was probably the fastest guy out there, so we wanted to do a good sprint for him.

"Coming into the final, it wasn't necessarily confusing, but I think a lot of guys were pretty gassed at the top. [Wippert] yelled at me to go and I had a little gap, and I just kept rolling it. He ran in second, and I think he basically just let me win."

Howes' stage win comes less than month after he won the opening stage at the Colorado Classic, following up on two stage wins he took at the Cascade Cycling Classic in July while riding for a composite US national team.

"I kind of had a rough spring where nothing seemed to go right," Howes said. "Things sort of came around after the Giro, and honestly I couldn't be happier getting results here in North America. Colorado is a hometown race for me, and up here in Alberta it's kind of like a northern brother of Colorado."

Rally kept a five-man breakaway in check for most of the day with help from Cannondale, and then handed off duties on the front to Holowesko once the catch was made on the final circuit in Edmonton. Holowesko tried to set up John Murphy for the win, but the lead out got swarmed in the last half a kilometre before Howes and Wippert surged to the front.

Huffman, who now leads teammate Sepp Kuss by 18 seconds, while Howes and teammate Tom-Jelte Slagter are both 31 seconds back in third and fourth, respectively. Rally's race leader said stage 3 was a fairly straightforward day for him and his team, although they did have to work hard to keep the breakaway in check.

"Today went pretty much according to plan," Huffman said. "It was aggressive at the start, just like yesterday. In the end there was a fairly dangerous breakaway with a couple of guys that were not too far down on GC. We had to really work for it to keep it close, and luckily Cannondale helped a little bit. The last couple of laps we got some help from some other teams that were interested in a sprint, so all in all it was a fairly straightforward race for me, but we definitely had to do some work today."

How it unfolded

The third stage consisted of 11 loops around a relatively flat 10.6km circuit in urban Edmonton, with two KOMs on laps three and six, and two intermediate sprints at the start/finish on laps eight and 10.

Two riders escaped the bunch just after the peloton started the second lap, with Travis McCabe (UnitedHealthcare) and Olivier Brisebois (Garneau-Quebecor) getting a bit of leash. The short nature of the 116.7km stage meant the peloton was particular about which riders it would let up the road, and the duo were soon back in the bunch.

McCabe remained active in the front during the third lap, taking maximum points on the KOM ahead of James Piccoli (Elevate-KHS) and Alex Cowan (Silber Pro Cycling).

A group of five escaped on lap 5 that included Joe Lewis (Holowesko-Ciatdel), Alex Cataford (UnitedHealthcare), Josh Berry (Jelly Belly-Maxxis), Nigel Ellsay (Silber Pro Cycling) and Zeke Mostov (Aevolo).

The new leaders built a gap of 1:15 over the field by the end of the lap, while Brian McCulloch (Elevate-KHS) and Travis Samuel (H&R Block) found themselves in no-man's land trying to bridge.

Ellsay was the best-placed rider in the lead group at 55 seconds down, making him the virtual leader on the road while Rally led the chase in the field. Mostov took maximum points on the lap-six KOM. The gap was down to just 45 seconds as the leaders saw four to go, with Rally still leading the chase and Cannondale-Drapac backing them up.

The leaders' gap was back up to one minute when they went through the start/finish with three to go. Ellsay took the maximum sprint points and a three-second time bonus while the rest of the escapees rolled across the line.

The gap was down to 46 seconds when the leaders went through the start finish with two laps remaining, and by the time they came around again to take the bell for the final lap, the field had brought the leaders' gap down to just 15 seconds. Ellsay, who started the day 14th, took the sprint points again and tucked away another three-second time bonus, moving him into the top 10 on GC.

The field was quickly on the escapees after that, and the race reshuffled once again for the finish. Hincapie took over the front once the catch was made, and then Medellin-Inder came up a little too early with 1km to go. McCabe took over the front at 500 metres, pulling Holowesko's John Murphy before Howes moved to the front to lead out Wippert.

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