Caleb Ewan of Orica Scott made it three wins out of four stages when he took the win on stage four of the nineteenth Tour Down Under in South Australia.
Richie Porte of BMC was in the leader’s ochre jersey and the KOM jersey and led the riders out on a 149.5km stage four from Norwood to Campbelltown which had a difficult parcours,
The opening break came after twelve kilometres and comprised Ondrej Cink of Bahrain Merida who was the highest placed rider on GC at 57 seconds, Jack Bauer of Quick Step and Cameron Meyer UniSA-Australia.
Six kilometres later, they were a minute clear and were 2.16 ahead when Cink, the former Mountain Biker, attacked on the Checker Hill Road KOM climb and took the points.
The gap went out to 2.55 but was down to 2.26 with 119kms left as they headed for the first iiNet sprint at Birdswood after 37.5km which was won by Bauer ahead of Meyer and Cink.
The peloton on what should be a day for the sprinters, were working together and the gap to the trio in the break continued to fall, dropping to 1.25 after 48kms.
The trio kept going and were 1.30 clear with 60kms to go on a sunny day as Cameron Meyer rode through the second sprint, ahead of Bauer and Cink, to take the points and the three seconds but not affect Caleb Ewan in the sprints jersey.
Cink then sat up and waited for the peloton to sweep him up leaving Bauer and Meyer, the two most combative riders of the day, up front who were being chased by Michael Valgren of Astana and Lars Bak, with a lead of 1.25 over the peloton. Will Clarke, had been one of the chasers but he punctured although he was soon back in the peloton.
After failing to make any ground to the leaders, Valgren and Bak sat up and let Bauer and Meyer extend their lead to 1.50 before the peloton upped the pace and it was down to 45 seconds when Cameron Meyer dropped back to the peloton.
Jack Bauer started on the twenty kilometre descent through Cudly Creek and Dam Wall at speeds of 72kmh and went into the final twenty kilometres with a lead of thirty three seconds.
Luke Durbridge and Impey took to the front of the peloton which was only twenty seconds back from a time trialling Bauer with 18kms left.
At speeds of 83kmh, Bauer got on to the fastest part of the course but he was only ten seconds head going into the final nine kilometres of stage four.
The peloton had the New Zealander in their sights and with 3kms left, they had him on the end of the Gorge Road.
Peter Sagan was on Caleb Ewan’s wheel as they went under the flam rouge.
A rider went on the left and was pulled back. Team Sky’s Danny Van Poppel went down the right but up came Caleb Ewan of Orica Scott to win in3.45.19 ahead of Sagan, Van Poppel and Ben Swift.
Richie Porte of BMC keeps his race lead by a 22 second margin whilst Ewan, who picked up his third win in a week and the fifth this month extends his lead in the point competition.
Source: DSG
