Wie de indruk
mocht hebben dat er vandaag weinig gebeurd is, hier het behoorlijk smakelijke inside-verslag van Neil van der Ploeg...
"Stage 3 was a six lap circuit race, 100kms total distance with a few climbs every lap. A little bit like the National Championship course in Buninyong. We expected it to be pretty tough, and it delivered!
The start of the race was interesting, in a really boring way. Literally within 5km of racing 4 riders were off the front when Drapac and Orica Green Edge formed a wall, and blocked the road. Effective, but what a crappy tactic for the racing. A rider from the Soul Team tried to force his way through, and while I didn’t see the whole incident, it ended in the Korean getting a MASSIVE serve from Jens Mouris and Greame Brown. In my opinion, if you want to block the road like that, you have to expect some people will try and barge through! Wouter Wippert was also trying to use the yellow jersey as a form of intimidation. A rider from Tabriz Petrochemical (TPT) managed to sneak through, despite Wippert chopping him up a few times. Wippert then chased him down, yelled at him and got in front and began blocking him, swerving all over the road! Comical, but in my opinion a pretty ugly display of bullying. Mind you, given the team of the rider, he probably deserves far more than what he got!
Anyway, apart from that action, the racing was thoroughly boring for the first lap. On the second lap however, some Pishgammon Giant and TPT riders absolutely lit it up the climb. That gave us a good taste of what would surely come in the finishing laps if the racing got aggressive.
OGE were riding the front and keeping the gap to around 2minutes. On the 4th lap, the gap was around 1:30 and we decided it was time to make a move. Mitch and Fraser went forward and drove the pace hard for a few kms to get the gap down to within a minute for the last two laps. We wanted some aggressive racing to test the likes of Ewan, Wippert and some of the other sprinters, hoping that we would be able to get on the front foot. Before the climbs on the second last lap, the gap was at 50s and the racing opened up! Great work Mitch and Fraser, job done.
The climb on that lap was very solid with lots of attacks, with Cooper and Bevin getting right amongst it. The race split over the top, with our remaining four in the front group, but it swelled once again on the descent. Meanwhile, launches left, right and centre. Cooper again shot himself up the road chasing a few others forming a small but dangerous looking group. OGE quickly realised the danger and threw Leigh Howard up the road and stopped chasing. BAM- right on cue, AJ launched himself and Paddy across the gap, forcing OGE to do the same to shut it down. A TPT and Pishgammon Giant rider were off the front, and strangely, it was Pishgammon Giant who were chasing? They must have wanted to keep the gap to something bridgeable for the final climb. But they probably didn’t need to worry, as the final climb was ridden very, very aggressively and the two leaders were swallowed up.
OGE entered the final 3km for an impressive 4 riders on the front of the reduced bunch. Paddy, myself and AJ stacked up behind the OGE train and waited for the finish. I moved up on the left of the OGE train at some point within the final km and shortly after. BAM AJ took a flyer up the right hand side with Paddy on his wheel into the second last corner- a right hander onto a bridge. It looked like they had the jump! But from the final corner it was 300m and just a little too far for Paddy, who was ran down convincingly by Ewan who took a nice run at him from behind. Another 2nd place. Not quite a win, but still a solid result given the quality of our opposition.
When I moved up on the left it allowed AJ to take a sneaky attack on the right, but on reflection, I should have waited a little longer, and belted it on the right with the others on the wheel. Honing things just a little more each day, we remain hopeful that a win is just around the corner!
Thanks for reading,
@neilvdp"
http://avantiracingteam.com.au/vandys-tour-of-korea-diary-stage-three/
