Tour of Britain: Trentin wins stage 6 in Nottingham

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Edvald Boasson Hagen took the Tour of Britain by the scruff of its neck, taking sole responsibility for chasing down the day's breakaway and then bridging across to the last man standing, Matteo Trentin (Etixx-Quickstep), leaving his rivals in his wake.

“When I saw him two kilometres from the finish and I thought he would close on me,” said Trentin. “When he arrived we had a good gap but everyone was on the limit because that was probably the hardest race we’d ever done. We went full gas from the start. I sat for a moment in his wheel and took a chance to breathe for the first time in 100 kilometres and then I just jumped past him and win.”

The MTN-Qhubeka rider stormed into Nottingham in the yellow jersey, not worrying about leading out the sprint ahead for Trentin, who handily won the stage, but rather focussed on taking out the six second time bonus and maximizing the gap to the peloton containing second-placed Wout Poels and Team Sky.

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The Norwegian champion extended his lead in the general classification from a solitary second over Poels to a more generous double-digit margin in the end. He now holds a 13-second lead over Poels, with Rasmus Guldhammer (Cult Energy) remaining in third overall, now at 41 seconds.

Should Boasson Hagen hold his lead to the end of the Tour of Britain, he will be the first double winner in the race's history, having won the race for Colombia-HTC back in 2009.

How it happened

Stage 6 of the Tour of Britain would likely be the final opportunity for any general classification hopefuls to make their mark. Edvald Boasson Hagen (MTN-Qhubeka) began the day in the yellow jersey with a lead of a single second over Wout Poels (Team Sky), who won the previous day’s stage.

There was action right from the start and for the second day running, Mark Cavendish (Etixx-QuickStep) crashed. He was relatively unscathed in Thursday’s incident but this time the Manxman would eventually abandon. It was a fast and furious start to the day and a large gruppetto formed very quickly with only around 30 riders making it into the front group.

With only a second’s cushion in the leader’s jersey Boasson Hagen wasn’t taking any chances and attacked early on to hoover up the three bonus seconds at the first sprint. Poels was third over the line for a second but the Norwegian had managed to bring his lead over the Sky rider to three seconds. There was a lot of chopping and changing at the front with a move containing Zdenek Stybar (Etixx-QuickStep) and Steven Kruijswijk (LottoNL-Jumbo) getting shut down.

An eight-man move did eventually form with Ian Stannard (Team Sky), Matteo Trentin (Etixx-QuickStep), Stefan Keung (BMC), Gorka Izagirre (Movistar), Sebastian Langeveld (Cannondale-Garmin), Bram Tankink (LottoNL-Jumbo) and Jens Debuscherre (Lotto-Soudal) making it away. It was reduced to just seven riders when Stannard was called back to assist his teammates in the bunch.

With Izagirre at just 51 seconds down on Boasson Hagen, the escapees were never given too much room at the front. Team Sky did the majority of the work on the front of the bunch, setting a blistering pace and keeping the advantage under two minutes. In fact, the pace set by Team Sky was so fast that they briefly split the peloton again but they still couldn’t shake Boasson Hagen, who was glued to the rear of their train.

As the race approached Nottingham, the break’s advantage had come down to under the 30-second mark and they began attacking themselves. Izagirre was one of the first to go with 35 kilometres remaining. He held out for some time but he was eventually brought back by three of his former companions including Trentin. The Italian was the next to attack at nine kilometres to go but his advantage looked slim and his chances of making it stick even slimmer.

Boasson Hagen bided his time in the peloton and waited until three to go to make another dig off the front of the peloton. Behind him, Poels was now isolated after his remaining teammates pulled off and Boasson Hagen was able to get away. He made the junction with just two kilometres left and, with the peloton charging down on them, they road to the line together.

Boasson Hagen led the sprint but Trentin came around him to take the stage win with Boasson Hagen extending his lead in the overall classification.

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