Tour de Suisse 2014 – Stage 5 Preview

By David Hunter

Stage 4 Recap

We got the sprint that most teams wanted. Giant – Shimano were doing a good lead-out, but Degenkolb wasn’t on the end of the train. Instead it was Mark Renshaw. Before he managed to hit top speed, Sacha Modolo launched the sprint. Sagan attacked from the right, and took a lead, before Cavendish turned on the throttle and powered away. It was a classy win for him, with a fast finishing Lobato, 2nd, and Sagan 3rd.

Stage 5 Ossingen – Buren a. Aare 183.6km

Another day for the sprinters.

This stage looks like the easiest one, on paper. Most of the climbing happens in the opening half, when the pace will be slow. The last climb crests with 15km remaining and is 1.4km at 5.9%. This is a very short climb and will be easy for the sprinters. The end of the stage is on a very gentle upslope of around 1%. Again, this is nothing to write home about.

There are plenty of teams here with sprinters, so that means we’ll get another sprint.

The finish to the stage is tough, with 2 corners inside the last 300 metres. The finishing straight is only 150 metres long. This means that positioning is everything and fast acceleration is a must.

This knocks a few of the diesels out: Kristoff and Van Poppel are two of them.

The likely scenario is that Renshaw leads Cavendish into the final corners and he wins the stage. John Degenkolb lost his lead-out train, in stage 4, perhaps hampered by crashing in the neutral zone. He has some making up to do.

Modolo was well placed today, but went too early. He benefits from messy finishes and this is another. I would expect to see him on the podium.

Cavendish was brilliant today. When Sagan took the lead, he easily found another gear. This reminded me of the Cav of old!

Peter Sagan is also good in a difficult finish, thanks to his wonderful bike handling skills. He’ll go close in this stage.

Prediction time…

Looks like another Cavendish win, with Modolo 2nd.

David Hunter

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