Mitchelton-Scott's Nick Schultz beat some of the world's best climbers at their own game to win stage 4 of the 2019 Jayco Herald Sun Tour on Saturday, beating Team Sky's Dylan van Baarle on the final climb to Arthurs Seat, with Van Baarle taking the overall race lead. Van Baarle and Schultz were part of an eight-rider breakaway that established itself early on the stage, and the pair were left at the head of affairs on the attritional stage as the finish laps over the three-kilometre climb ticked down. The chase group that included overnight leader Michael Woods (EF Education First) and race favourite Richie Porte (Trek-Segafredo) was never able to get back on terms, with both riders having been left without any teammates to assist them in the latter stages, and Woods finished sixth on the stage, 2:14 down, while Porte finished another 13 seconds down in eighth place.ADVERTISEMENT While Van Baarle now leads Schultz overall by 24 seconds, Woods and Porte sit in third and fourth place on the GC, 1:52 and 2:09 down, respectively. With just one stage to go on a course around Melbourne's Royal Botanic Gardens on Sunday – a stage that should suit the sprinters – Van Baarle's overall lead should remain safe. "I think that at the bottom of the final climb Dylan and I were both at our limit," Schultz told reporters at the finish, having led Van Baarle all the way up Arthurs Seat on the fourth and final ascent. "He pulled harder than me on the flat part of the circuit, or the descent, so I had an inkling that we were both at our limit, and I think that also with his GC ambitions in mind, it suited him for me to ride as hard as I could up the climb as well, so it all worked out well," the 24-year-old Australian said.
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