Tour Down Under 2018 | Stage 4 Report

Anticipated as the wildcard stage of this year’s Tour Down Under, Stage 4 featured the brand new finish town of Uraidla and before that, the climb of Norton Summit.

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An earlier start for the riders due to another incredibly hot day in South Australia. Two riders went off the front early, they were Zak Dempster of Israel Cycling Academy and Alex Porter of Bennelong Swiss Wellness, of course both riding this race in UNI-SA team colours.

They were let off the leash and had a lead of 10 minutes by the time they rolled through the first intermediate sprint at Birdwood, with Dempster crossing first. The peloton had been keeping things very steady a handful of riders did contest third place Elia Viviani grabbed a couple more sprint points.

Shortly after, the 2nd intermediate sprint at Charleston was taken by Porter from his breakaway buddy Dempster, Viviani again nabbed third place, albeit without too much of a contest this time.
Porter gave up soon after, while Dempster stayed away until about 20km to go when he was absorbed and the peloton braced themselves for Norton Summit.

Miles Scotson of BMC was tasked with setting a hard pace at the foot of the climb to dissuade attacks from other teams He peeled off to allow new recruit Simon Gerrans to continue the tempo. This tactic was shedding riders off the back at a steady rate - Caleb Ewan would not retain the ochre jersey for another day, but even riders like Nathan Haas were finding the pace hard to deal with, with speeds well over 30km/h uphill.

The top of the climb arrived in a flash, with Gerrans leading the reduced bunch of about 30 riders over the top, with Porte inching his way up to grab a handful of King of the Mountains points.

A flurry of attacks ensued on the rolling roads towards the finish. Michael Valgren, Lars Bak, Peter Sagan and Richie Porte all had a go in the run in to the finish line, but couldn’t find the separation.

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Photos: © Bettiniphoto / http://www.bettiniphoto.net/ & ©Tim De Waele / http://www.tdwsport.com

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