Bouhanni sprints to victory in Yanqing

Nacer Bouhanni (FDJ.fr) claimed victory on stage two of the Tour of Beijing with an emphatic sprint finish in Yanqing. The Frenchman comfortably held off the challenges of Roberto Ferrari (Lampre-Merida) and Mitchell Docker (Orica-GreenEdge) to take his tenth win of the season and move into the red jersey of overall leader.

Both Argos-Shimano and Orica-GreenEdge made concerted attempts to control the peloton in the closing kilometres and seize the initiative for the inevitable bunch sprint, but in the end, the support of one man – Dominique Rollin – was enough to put Bouhanni in the box seat as he led into the gently sweeping final bend with 200 metres to go.

Rollin expertly piloted Bouhanni through the final kilometre and then powered his way to the front of the peloton inside the final 500 metres with his sprinter tucked on his wheel. As soon as the Canadian swung off a little more than 200 metres from home, Bouhanni accelerated and immediately opened a gap over the rest of the sprinters.

While Ferrari battled gamely to get back on terms, he simply couldn’t match Bouhanni’s punch, while Docker, Matti Breschel (Saxo-Tinkoff) and Alessandro Petacchi (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) were left to scramble for the minor placings.

“It was difficult but I had a good team around me to help me get back after each climb and Dominque Rollin was very helpful in the finale,” said Bouhanni. “My victory at Paris-Nice earlier in the season was certainly a big win as I got the yellow jersey there too but this one is a good win. Any victory is good to take.”

Overnight leader Thor Hushovd had delegated his BMC team to bring back the day’s early break but the Norwegian made no impact in the sprint and rolled across the line in 27th place and drops to second overall, albeit in the same time as Bouhanni.

Maxime Bouet (Ag2r-La Mondiale) moves up to third place, one second off the lead, after he picked up nine seconds in time bonuses during his spell off the front in the day's early break.

Early break

At 201 kilometres, stage two was the longest of the Tour of Beijing, but that did little to discourage a plethora of attackers from forming the day’s early break virtually from the off. Within the opening eight kilometres, Oliver Kaisen (Lotto Belisol) had punched his way clear, and was joined off the front of the bunch by Maxime Bouet (Ag2r-La Mondiale), Massimo Graziato (Lampre-Merida), Thomas De Gendt (Vacansoleil-DCM) and Chad Beyer (Champion System).

The quintet quickly established a lead of three minutes and that had extended to 4:30 by the team they reached the first intermediate sprint after 65.5 kilometres, where Maxime Bouet began clawing his way up the overall standings by claiming the bonus seconds on offer.

By that point, Thomas De Gendt had picked up maximum points on the day’s opening two king of the mountains climbs and he repeated the feat on the category two Cang Mi Gu Dao. Meanwhile, Hushovd’s BMC team had begun to pick up the pace in the main peloton behind, unwilling to grant too much leeway to break that contained a couple of dangermen for overall honours.

The break’s gap was floating just above the four-minute mark at the second intermediate sprint (110km) where Bouet claimed another three seconds in bonuses. A further injection of pace from BMC quickly shaved a couple of minutes off that buffer, however, and as the third and final sprint approached, the unity of the leading five began to fragment. When the dust settled after their game of attack and counter-attack, Kaisen and Bouet remained out in front, while De Gendt and Beyer gave forlorn chase behind them.

Bouet hoovered up another three seconds in bonuses at the final sprint with 35km to go, but with the Marco Pinotti-led bunch now less than two minutes behind, the Frenchman made a quick calculation and opted to sit up. Bouet’s haul of bonus seconds has moved him up to third place overall, one second off the red jersey, and with WorldTour points in mind, he clearly saw little value in pursuing the seemingly lost cause of stage victory.

Kaisen, meanwhile, continued to battle gamely off the front, but his lead was growing inexorably smaller as Pinotti and company continued to up the ante behind, and the Belgian was eventually caught with a little under 8 kilometres to go.

In the run-in to Yanqing, first Argos-Shimano and then Orica-GreenEdge muscled their way to the front of the peloton with Luka Mezgec and Mitchell Docker in mind, respectively, but neither team was able to impose its game plan on the finale.

Instead, it was Dominque Rollin who provided the winning assist by dribbling through the melange of riders at the front of the peloton and then calmly teeing it up for Bouhanni’s emphatic finish.

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