Tour of Britain: Ineos Grenadiers win team time trial

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Ineos Grenadiers claimed a home victory in the stage 3 team time trial at the Tour of Britain, moving Ethan Hayter into the overall lead. 

The British team clocked 20:22 on the rolling and technical 18.1-kilometre course in South Wales, beating Julian Alaphilippe’s Deceuninck-QuickStep by some 17 seconds, having been tied for time at the half-way mark. 

Jumbo-Visma finished third at 20 seconds but were left to wonder what might have been after Pascal Eenkoorn suffered a puncture in the final kilometre, leaving Wout van Aert, Tony Martin, and George Bennett to freewheel to the line looking around for the fourth rider they needed for their time to be registered. 

Rally Cycling were the last team to start but finished well down on Ineos’ time in 11th place and so stage 2 winner Robin Carpenter had to hand over the leader’s jersey to Hayter. 

The in-form 22-year-old Briton, who was fourth on the opening day and second on stage 2, established himself as the leader of the race and the leader of his own team, as Michał Kwiatkowski, who had been billed as a co-leader, was dropped from the train on the short climb in the latter phase of the course. 

Owain Doull had just been dropped at the base of the climb, but they still had three big engines in Rohan Dennis, Richie Porte and Carlos Rodríguez, before Hayter himself dragged the quartet to the line. 

“All six riders gave everything. We all rode a really good TTT, and that’s really satisfying to see,” said the new race leader.

Deceuninck-QuickStep, who set off earlier, had matched Ineos’ pace on the first half of the course but were slower on the climb. They sacrificed Tim Declercq and Davide Ballerini before Alaphilippe came to the line alongside Mark Cavendish, Yves Lampaert and Mikel Honoré. 

At the time, they’d beaten Jumbo-Visma’s benchmark by three seconds, forcing Van Aert and his teammates to curse their misfortune. When Ineos bettered their time by 20 seconds, the question of whether it had cost them the stage win was a little less clear cut, but it did cost Van Aert precious time in the overall standings. 

In any case, it was an impressive ride, as they started with just five riders after losing Chris Harper on stage 2 and then carried a virtual passenger in the form of youngster Gils Leemreize. They lost just 10 seconds to Ineos in the second half of the parcours, even accounting for the puncture. 

There was a gap of another 20 seconds back to Israel Start-Up Nation in fourth, while Team DSM and Alpecin-Fenix tied for time at 57 seconds to take fourth and fifth, as the only other teams within a minute of Ineos’ time. 

In the overall standings, Ineos have a one-two, with Hayter leading Dennis by six seconds. Van Aert, who picked up bonus seconds for his stage 1 win, is third at 16 seconds, ahead of Alaphilippe at 23 seconds. 

Israel Start-Up Nation’s leaders Michael Woods and Dan Martin are in seventh and eighth while Alpecin-Fenix also have two riders in the top 10 in Kristian Sbaragli and Xandro Meurisse.

“It’ll be very hard leading this race with five days left,” Hayter said. 

“It’s going to be super tough racing and it’ll be really hard to control. We’re up against it but it’s better to have 16 second than be behind by 16 seconds.”

How it unfolded

The Saint Piran team, local to the Cornwall region where the race started on Sunday, got stage 3 underway as the first team down the start ramp in South Wales. 

They clocked 22:56 and bettered the next team on the road, Swift Carbon, who suffered a mechanical, by six seconds, but it was a different British team who set the first real benchmark. Ribble-Weldtite, with James Shaw and aerodynamicist Dan Bigham in their ranks, went more than a minute quicker, stopping the clock at 21:31. 

After Global 6, the Great Britain national team, and Caja Rural had set off, Jumbo-Visma lined up as the first WorldTour team on the start ramp. The Dutch squad had just five riders at their disposal, with Chris Harper having crashed out the previous day, and it soon became apparent they were effectively riding as a quartet, as youngster Gils Leemreize remained glued to the back of the line. They suffered another setback in the final kilometre when Eenkhoorn punctured, forcing Van Aert, Martin, and Bennett to freewheel to the finish while looking around for their teammate.

Despite the setback, and despite having not been much clear of Ribble-Weldtite at the half-way mark, they beat the best time by some 49 seconds to clock 20:42. However, the cost of the puncture soon became apparent when Deceuninck-QuickStep went through the half-way mark seven seconds up and then reached the finish three seconds up, with Alaphilippe, Cavendish, Lampaert, and Honoré their finishing four. 

Israel Start-Up Nation had suffered a mechanical of their own, losing Andre Greipel to a saddle problem, and they finished 29 second down, just after Trinity Racing had made themselves the second best of the British teams. 

Qhubeka-NextHash fell apart in the latter phases of their rider, apparently due to Mauro Schmidt crashing. The Swiss youngster, who won a stage of this year’s Giro d’Italia, couldn’t hold the wheel and crossed the line with blood on his knee after an utterly ragged final two kilometres from the team’s final four riders. They ended up finishing more than two minutes in arrears of Deceuninck-QuickStep. 

After Canyon-DhB had set 22:24, Arkéa-Samsic set off with a bare four riders, having only brought five to the race and then losing Bram Welten on the opening day. They remained cohesive but couldn’t get anywhere near Deceuninck-QuickStep, at 1:10 down. 

Alpecin-Fenix lost Silvan Dillier from their final four but went fourth fastest at 40 seconds, but that didn’t last long as Team DSM came home and nudged them out by a fraction of a second. 

Ineos Grenadiers, with Ethan Hayter wearing a light blue skin suit as leader of the points classification, were the penultimate team down the ramp, just ahead of the Rally Cycling squad of stage 2 winner and overall leader Robin Carpenter. Ineos quickly put themselves right into the mix, equalling Deceuninck-QuickStep’s time at the checkpoint, where they still had all six riders. However, as they hit the climb, they were quickly down to five, with Owain Doull immediately losing contact and then Kwiatkowski falling away further up. It turned out to be well-paced as the final four remained glued together on the dip down and the final couple of flat kilometres, with Hayter producing another final injection of pace to bring them to the line. 

Rally Cycling were the only team left out on the course but it was soon apparent that they would get nowhere near Ineos’ time and that Carpenter would be handing over the leader's jersey after one day in navy blue.