Lemmen takes strong victory on crash affected Tour de Pologne stage 4
Heavy rain and demanding climbs shaped stage four of the Tour de Pologne, with the stage briefly neutralised after a crash with 40 kilometres to go. Bart Lemmen won the stage after attacking out of a front trio with 4.5 kilometres to go and assumed the GC lead.
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Bart Lemmen (Visma | Lease a Bike) secured victory on stage four of the Tour de Pologne in Karpacz, timing his effort to perfection to claim the stage honours.
The stage was neutralised with 40km to go due to a mass crash involving over 20 riders, including UAE's Joao Almeida.
Christian Scaroni (XDS Astana) finished second on the stage, with Axel Laurence (Netcompany-Ineos) rounding out the podium.
In the general classification, Bart Lemmen took the overall lead, opening a buffer ahead of the key GC contenders following the category 1 climb.
How it unfolded
The early action saw an aggressive start out of Żagań as the escape group formed under heavy rain. Dries De Bondt (Team Jayco AlUla) and Matteo Malucelli (XDS Astana Team) immediately established a strong group with Tobiasz Pawlak (ATT Investments) and Patryk Stosz (Voster Team), forcing a gap over the rolling opening portion of stage 4.
As the race approached the final third, the gap hovered around the two-minute mark. UAE Team Emirates assumed control on the front of the peloton, regulating the pace to keep the escapees within striking distance ahead of the originally scheduled category 3 Antoniów climb.
The race was neutralised following a major crash involving at least 20 riders in the peloton with 40 kilometres to go.
The crash brought down a series of riders across multiple teams, with UAE Team Emirates-XRG, Team Visma | Lease a Bike, Bahrain-Victorious, EF Education-EasyPost, Groupama-FDJ United and Tudor Pro Cycling among the squads affected.
The race was initially paused before being neutralised as officials responded to the crash.
The organisers subsequently cut 15km from the stage total to allow the race to continue on a compressed course.
Once the race resumed, the peloton stretched out as Tobiasz Pawlak (Poland) was caught.
Milan was dropped from the peloton shortly after the restart, with Almeida following him out of the front group as the race approached the closing climbs, perhaps as a consequence of the crash.
Dries De Bondt (Jayco AlUla), Matteo Malucelli and Patryk Stosz opened the gap on the peloton in the aftermath of the resumption, with De Bondt taking the race lead by 26 seconds ahead of Malucelli.
The peloton chased at 49 seconds.
With less than 10 kilometres to go and on the final climb of the day, De Bondt was joined by the Polish rider, Stosz, and the pair had just 22 seconds.
The duo was reeled in with kilometres to go as Bahrain Victorious had the peloton under full control.
Visma were the first team to attack with Bart Lemmen and Tijmen Graat, with Christian Scaroni (XDS Astana) and Marco Brenner (Tudor) joining the Visma pair.
Heading the final 5 kilometres, just Brenner, Lemmen and Scaroni remained, and the trio looked set to compete for the stage honours until Lemmen rocketed away with 4.5km to go.
It was a never-say-die attitude for Scaroni in the uphill run to the line, with Lemmen winning by a reduced margin of a bike length as the Italian simply ran out of road.
Race result: 2026 Tour de Pologne - Stage 4
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