A big day out for the Grenadiers saw a full team effort tackle tough conditions at Flèche Wallonne, while AJ August worked in the break all day and Thymen Arensman continued his GC campaign at Tour of the Alps.
Flèche Wallonne
The Ardennes Classics continued with a soaking Flèche Wallonne, which saw Artem Shmidt and Tobias Foss in the break, before Magnus Sheffield and Axel Laurance claimed top 20 placings in Belgium.
Shmidt was the first to get stuck into an early break, with Foss bridging over to form a front group of seven with 39km remaining.
Shmidt was reeled in with 42km to go, as Foss clung on to the lead with his fellow countrymen Fredrik Dversnes and Andreas Leknessund (UNO-X Mobility).
With 7km to go, Foss was caught as the peloton’s pace ramped up. A solo effort up the final climb, Mur de Huy, saw Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) take the win, as Sheffield and Laurance battled to the line to finish in 17th and 20th place, respectively, as part of the main bunch.
Reaction
Tobias Foss:
“It was quite clear that Quick-Step wanted to go quite hard on the climbs, just to make people tired. They brought [the gap to the break] really close, to like 40-45 seconds. I thought it was a good moment to try. We managed to bridge up together. It was a really good race and those two Uno-X guys I knew were strong.
“I just missed a little bit of the legs in the end so it’s a bit of a shame. It would have been nice to race all the way to the line – but we gave it a good crack.”
Tour of the Alps
AJ August showed his breakaway prowess once again on the third stage of the Tour of the Alps, before finishing in the main bunch with Thymen Arensman.
Tackling two categorised climbs over 143.7km, August was involved in the 21-man breakaway with 91km remaining, racking up a two minute lead as riders were dropped under the blistering pace.
Marco Frigo (Israel-Premier Tech) escaped solo, with August chasing in a group of three alongside Finlay Pickering (Bahrain-Victorious) and Frederik Wandahl (Red Bull–Bora–Hansgrohe) a minute back with 30km to go.
The chasing peloton reeled in the trio on the final run into Innichen, with Frigo going on to take the stage win. Thymen Arensman finished in 14th as August came home 19th in the bunch.
