Jasper Philipsen hindered by his own lead-out in Vuelta sprint
Alpecin-Deceuninck rode almost the perfect race for the bunch finish on stage 4 of the Vuelta a España, but Jasper Philipsen and lead-out man Edward Planckaert's communication was hampered by the noise in the finishing straight.
Japser Philipsen was downbeat after missing out on the win at stage 4 of the Vuelta España on Tuesday and questioned whether he was able to finish the race.
"It's shit for us, because we were very strong. But honestly, I didn't have the best legs either. I felt at the end that I didn't have the most left," Philipsen told VTM Nieuws after finishing second behind Ben Turner (Ineos Grenadiers) in Voiron. "How do I see the rest of the Vuelta? We're going to try to take it day by day, try to survive and grow because I'm still lacking some form.”
Philipsen has endured a mixed season. He arrived at the Tour de France with the ambition of winning stages and the green jersey points classification and he won the opening stage of the Tour to wear yellow. But the high didn’t last long, as a horror crash on stage three putting him out of the race and out of action. He bounced back, however, to win the opening stage of the Vuelta and enjoy a day in the red jersey.
Alpecin-Deceuninck are well versed in the art of the bunch sprint. In Philipsen they have one of the world’s best sprinters, and with no GC rider the team is built around those fast finishes.
So it was no surprise how well the team performed on the Vuelta’s longest stage on Tuesday. At 206.7km it was the longest stage of the race, and with a over 3,000m of climbing the day was easily the most uphill metres of the race so far, even if all the climbing was early in the day.
While they kept themselves safe, we didn’t see much of the team until the final 10km, their lead out sat third row, behind those who wanted to dominate the road, and they only moved up just outside the final kilometre.
In the finishing straight it seemed inevitable Philipsen would take a second stage win of this year’s Vuelta. But he was unable to get around team mate and final lead out man Edward Plankaert, the victory going to Ben Turner (Ineos Grenadiers).
“We did a really good job with the team,” Philipsen said after the race. “Edward was super strong and I wanted to launch from the left, but he didn’t hear me with all the spectators, and it was also still far out. And then I lost a bit of speed and momentum. But, yeah, shit for us.
"The finish wasn't completely straight, which made it a bit more difficult, but my feeling isn't great at all."
