Sam Bennett outsprints Wout van Aert to take victory in third stage of Criterium du Dauphine
Jun 11 2019 10:59 pm CET
Photo of Sam Bennett (c)BORA-hansgrohe / VeloImages
Bora-hansgrohe's Sam Bennett beat Wout van Aert and Davide Ballerini to take the victory of the third stage of the Criterium du Dauphine. Dylan Teuns kept the GC lead for another day.
The third stage of the French race was one for the sprinters, with a mostly flat route that took the peloton from Le Puy en Velay to Riom over 177 kilometres. Just like the day before, the rain was prevalent throughout the day and very early on the route Natnael Berhane (Cofidis) and Quentin Pacher (Vital Concept) broke away.
The duo built a gap of more than three minutes with a peloton led by teams like Bora-hansgrohe, Bahrain-Merida, Deceuninck-Quick-Step and Arkea Samsic. With 18 kilometres to go and as the pack got closer to the escapees, one of the favourites to win the stage Alvaro Hodeg suffered a puncture.
At ten kilometres from the finish, the adventure was over for the breakaway men and three kilometres later Katusha-Alpecin's Ruben Guerreiro suffered a crash that forced him to abandon the race. Deceuninck-Quick-Step managed to bring the Colombian sprinter back to the pack and the team took control of the pace of the peloton in the last kilometres.
Bora-hansgrohe's Sam Bennett launched a strong sprint in the last metres that couldn't be matched by the rest and took his seventh victory of the season. Jumbo-Visma's Wout van Aert and Astana's Davide Ballerini crossed the finish line just behind the Irishman.
Dylan Teuns (Bahrain-Merida) maintained the lead of the overall classification of the French race.
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