Tour of Britain: Greipel wins stage 4

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André Greipel (Lotto Soudal) won stage 4 of the Tour of Britain in a bunch sprint in Royal Leamington Spa. The German delivered a powerful finish to come home ahead of Sacha Modolo (EF-Drapac) and Patrick Bevin (BMC Racing Team), who retains the overall lead.

The emphatic victory was Greipel's second of the race after his triumph in Newport on the opening day. Greipel was sagely tucked into third position coming into the sharp left-hand bend that preceded the finishing straight, and he proceeded to unleash a characteristically imposing sprint from distance to notch up his eighth win of the season.

"I knew it was going to be a long sprint, but I just went full gas out of the corner and it worked perfectly I guess. If you're not in front after the corner, it's difficult to do your own sprint," Greipel said afterwards. "It was important to have a good position there [in the final corner]. The other guys made a really great job to keep me up there, it was really messy. Jasper [De Buyst] did a good job for me, he was strong."

While Greipel's raw strength carried him to the stage win, Bevin's third-place finish owed as much to the quickness of his thinking as it did to the considerable speed of his legs. The New Zealander cannily stole into first place on the final corner by taking the inside line in a manner reminiscent of Oscar Freire, and though he was overpowered by Greipel and Modolo within sight of the line, he did enough to earn a four-second time bonus and buttress his overall lead.

Bevin is now four seconds ahead of Cameron Meyer (Mitchelton-Scott) and six up on Julian Alaphilippe (Quick-Step Floors) in the general classification ahead of Thursday's team time trial in Cockermouth.

"It was the plan to be first into the last corner," Bevin said. "If you're going to lead out, you're not going to win, but you might get a podium and some more time. With 400 metres to go I had Jempy [Drucker] drop me off and then I came up the inside of the corner."

Rick Zabel (Katusha-Alpecin) placed fourth on the stage ahead of Carlos Barbero (Movistar), while Emils Liepinš (ONE Pro Cycling) came sixth. Neither Caleb Ewan (Mitchelton-Scott) nor Fernando Gaviria – whose Quick-Step Floors team was so prominent in chasing down the break – made any impact in the sprint.

How it unfolded

There was precious little resistance to the formation of the day's early break as the Tour of Britain left the start in Nuneaton on Wednesday. Paul Ourselin (Direct Energie), Thomas Moses (JLT Condor), Matthew Holmes (Madison Genesis), Alex Paton (Canyon-Eisberg), Nicholas Dlamini (Dimension Data) and Hayden McCormick (ONE Pro Cycling) forged clear in the opening kilometre and the peloton was happy to grant the sextet a degree of freedom.

The escapees quickly established a lead of two minutes over the bunch, where Mitchelton-Scott, Quick-Step, Lotto Soudal and BMC all contributed on the front at various points to keep the advantage within manageable dimensions.

Holmes led the break over the climb at Ilmington, Edge Hill and Burton Dassett, but Dlamini was second on each occasion, and that was enough to put the South African into the lead in the king of the mountains classification.

His work done for the day, Dlamini dropped back from the break with 35km to go, by which point the gap was hovering above the one-minute mark. Ewan was briefly distanced from the peloton, which only served to increase the intensity of the chase, though the Australian quickly regained contact ahead of the run-in.

Iljo Keisse (Quick-Step), Robert Power (Mitchelton-Scott) and Jens Keukeleire (Lotto Soudal) were particularly prominent in helping to shut down the break, and Keisse kept up his effort deep into the finale, remaining on the front into the final 5 kilometres.

By that point, only Ourselin and McCormick remained in front from the early break, and they were swept up soon afterwards as the speed ratcheted upwards ahead of the inevitable bunch finish.

EF-Drapac led into the final two kilometres, before Julian Alaphilippe took over for Quick-Step beneath the flamme rouge. Bob Jungels followed with a long turn on the front, but Gaviria was never in the running in the sprint. Greipel emerged from the chaos to claim a resounding win, while Bevin had the nous to ensure he bolstered his overall advantage ahead of Thursday's novel, 14km team time trial, the second half of which is almost entirely uphill.

"It is very different, but it's what we came here to target," Bevin said of the team time trial. "Everything up to this point has been a bonus. It's tough to read, and I think that if any team has a bad day they'll lose a lot of time and that'll be their overall chances gone."

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