Tour of California: Asgreen wins stage 2 as van Garderen takes race lead

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Kasper Asgreen (Deceuninck-QuickStep) claimed stage 2 of the Tour of California after beating Tejay van Garderen (EF Education First) and Gianni Moscon (Team Ineos) to the line in the first mountain stage of this year's race.

The young Danish rider was an attacking presence throughout the second half of the stage and made it into the winning break that included van Garderen, Moscon and several overall contenders. It was van Garderen who attacked on the final climb from a reduced group with 1.6km to go but he was marked by Asgreen, Moscon and UAE Team Emirates' Tadej Pogačar. With the line in sight, Asgreen kicked for home and his acceleration was enough to hold off van Garderen, with Moscon fading to third.

The victory marked Asgreen's first individual triumph on the WorldTour stage, while van Garderen's second place was enough to see the former race winner move into the overall lead. Overnight leader Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) struggled on the mountainous terrain and dropped down the overall standings on a day that saw a number of the pre-race favourites struggle to make an impression. Van Garderen now leads Moscon by six seconds, with Asgreen a further second down.

"It's my first pro win, so I'm really, really happy right now,” Asgreen told reporters, including Cyclingnews, after the stage. "It's huge for me, and to take it on a stage like this, a really hard stage, I'm really happy with that."

How it unfolded

Stage 2 at the Tour of California travelled 214.5km from Rancho Cordova to South Lake Tahoe. The route included four KOMs, two intermediate sprints and nearly 4,500 metres of climbing. The stage topped out at 2,627 metres of elevation at Carson Pass – the highest point the Tour of California has ever climbed to.

The route had initially been planned for 194.5km, but snow on the Mormon Emigrant Trail highway forced organisers to create a slight detour that added the extra kilometres. With the reroute, the race lost the category 1 ascent of Sky Park Road and the cat. 2 Mormon Emigrant Pass, but instead used the category 3 Bucks Bar Road at 68.5km.

Not intimidated by the long day of climbing ahead, seven riders broke away just 8km into the stage. In the move were Luke Rowe (Team Ineos), Mads Pedersen (Trek-Segafredo), Evan Huffman (Rally UHC Cycling), Davide Ballerini (Astana Pro Team), Pawel Bernas (CCC Team), Michael Storer (Team Sunweb) and Michael Hernandez (USA National Team).

The gap ballooned up to three minutes less than 20km into the stage, and the chase was officially on. The peloton apparently decided that was enough of a gap, and the advantage stabilised between 2:45 and three minutes for nearly three hours.

Hernandez took the first sprint of the day at 51km in Placerville ahead of Pedersen and Ballerini, collecting three points and three bonus seconds. The next action came at the Decra Ravine KOM at 59.5km, where Huffman claimed maximum points ahead of Ballerini and Hernandez. At the Bucks Bar KOM less than 10km later, Ballerini beat Huffman and Hernandez to the line.

The peloton's pace picked up through a flat section after the second KOM, and the gap came down to 1:40 with 114km remaining, then shot up again to 2:45. The gap continued to fluctuate as it dropped again to 1:35 with 100km remaining.

A battle of wills developed between the peloton, which was keeping the break below two minutes, and the breakaway, which wanted more leash. The gap went up and down as the break would slow down and the peloton would react by slowing down as well.

Hagens Berman Axeon tired of the game and sent Edward Anderson off the front of the peloton. The 21-year-old American was quickly out of sight and was able to bridge to the leaders, making a new lead group of eight.

The slow downs and accelerations also wreaked havoc on Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data), who popped out of the bunch and struggled to regain contact through the rest of the stage.

EF Education First went to the front and started hammering with about 80km to ride, and the gap started coming down precipitously. Most of the breakaway was soon back in the fold, but Anderson tried to stay away solo as EF had him in their sights from the front of the pack. Anderson was back in the pack with 75km to go, and the race had to reset.

Lachlan Morton (EF Education First) was the next rider to try his luck, jumping away with 65km to go in a solo move. Morton claimed top points at the Kirkwood KOM with 59km to go, and was quickly into descent mode. Ballerini jumped out of the group for second, and Huffman did the same for third.

A lead group of 14 riders survived the day-long battle of attrition, with pre-race overall favourites Rohan Dennis (Bahrain-Merida), Felix Grossschartner (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Lawson Craddock (EF Education First), third overall here in 2013, making the cut.

Israel Cycling Academy's Alex Cataford attacked before the fourth KOM at Carson Pass, opening a small gap to take maximum points and then continuing on alone. His move was short-lived, however, and the group was back together with 35km to go, with 1:15 over the remnants of the peloton.

David de la Cruz (Team Ineos) won the second intermediate sprint ahead of Dennis, denying the Australian the three-second time bonus, but leaving him the two seconds for second place. The peloton wasn't happy to let the race ride away, and they made the catch with 29km to go.

They wouldn't stick together for long, though. On the descent of Luther Pass, there were more splits as several riders jumped off the front. Asgreen was there once again, kickstarting the action, and soon there were 10 men up front, including van Garderen, Moscon, Ballerini, Craddock and Pogačar.

But Ballerini and Asgreen weren't satisfied and left that group behind to strike out for the line. They made a good fist of it but were caught just outside the 10km-to-go mark. From then on it was a waiting game as the ramp to the finish loomed.

Astana launched Ballerini off the front with 2km to go, but van Garderen lead the group back to the front. The pace of the EF rider shattered the group as the road reared up, leaving just him, Moscon, Asgreen and Pogačar in the lead.

Each man spent time on the front in the closing kilometre, although Pogačar was the first to drop back. It was Asgreen who put in the most telling turn, taking over from Moscon as the finish line neared to distance his companions and take the win, while second-placed van Garderen would console himself with the leader's jersey.

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