Dan Martin (Quick Step Floors) made a big jump on general classification at the Tour de France today when he finished third on the third stage to Longwy.
Starting from Verviers, the home town of Ronde van Vlaanderen and Amstel Gold Race champion Philippe Gilbert, stage 3 of the Tour de France saw the riders make a foray into Luxembourg before arriving in France for the first time of this edition, three days after the Grand Depart in Düsseldorf.
Frederik Backaert (Wanty-Groupe Gobert), Nathan Brown (Cannondale-Drapac), Adam Hansen (Lotto-Soudal), Romain Hardy (Fortuneo-Oscaro), Nils Politt (Katusha-Alpecin) and Romain Sicard (Direct Energie) formed the break of the day but their lead never extended beyond three minutes.
The deficit was reduced with around 70 kilometres to go, and this reduced gap allowed three other riders to jump clear from the bunch and join the leaders. However ten kilometres later everything came back together.
A frantic battle for positioning followed ahead of the last climb of the day, the 1600m-long Côte des Religieuses (5.8% average gradient), where Czech Champion Zdenek Stybar took the reins of the pack. Richie Porte (BMC) was the first to show his intentions on the steepest part of the hill, splitting the bunch, but the Australian couldn’t push this tempo all the way to the line, as other riders came strong from behind and forced a second selection.
Dan Martin was among them, and the Irishman opened a powerful acceleration on the second part of the ascent, when the gradients started to kick in again; that surge helped Dan finish third on the day, behind Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) and Michael Matthews (Team Sunweb), as the best of the general classification contenders.
The Quick-Step Floors rider’s brilliant effort in Longwy – which returned in the Tour de France after a 35-year hiatus – saw him take a total of six seconds on all the other race favourites, a welcomed bonus that helped him move up to 15th place in the overall rankings.
“That’s what I tried today and I’m really happy with how it went. I found the first part of the climb not so hard, but things changed once Richie attacked and lined out the peloton”, a satisfied Martin explained after the stage.
“The sprint was very long and I knew it was very important to bide your time. So I sat on Matthews’ wheel and launched my sprint when I sensed everybody was in the red. I never thought I would sprint against those guys, so to get this result at the end of such a hard day makes me very happy and confident. A big shout-out to my teammates, who did everything to bring me in the best position for this finish.”
