Stephen Williams (Israel-Premier Tech) won the final stage and the overall at the 2024 Tour Down Under in Mount Lofty. The Brit calmly covered all attacks in the final kilometres before opening up his sprint with 250 metres to go to claim his first stage win this week and successfully defend the ochre leader’s jersey.
Jhonatan Narvaez (Ineos Grenadiers) finished a close second, and Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates) was third in the final stage and in the general classification.
Tied on time with Oscar Onley (dsm-firmenich PostNL) and a few seconds lead on his rivals, Williams calmly stayed in the peloton controlled by his in the first half of the stage.
The general classification battle came to life in the final two kilometres after the Ineos Grenadiers led the peloton to catch the final breakaway rider on the lower slopes of Mt Lofty. First, Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla) accelerated first causing a split in the peloton and then Del Toro attacked which strung out the select group and briefly caught Williams out of position.
The Mexican rider was caught by Narvaez, Williams, Laurence Pithie (Groupama-FDJ) and Bart Lemmen (Visma-Lease A Bike). Pithie and then Del Toro each took a turn but Williams stayed in the wheels until he powered away and no one could match his pace.
After the win, Williams showed his emotions for the first time at the Australian stage race, when he described his thoughts when he crossed the finish line.
“Everything goes through your mind. Just how hard this sport is and to win races, they don't come around very often. To do it here in Australia, the first world tour race of the season is fantastic.”
“That finish is perfect for me. It's so punchy. I've got a knack of being able to hold and hold and hold. And luckily I was able to get back on the wheel, read the situation and, yeah, capitalised, opened up with, like, 250 to go and everyone's legs was dead by then, so if I thought if I got the jump, then I'd be in with a good chance.”
“What a stage, so over the moon, Honestly, the support the team have given me the last few days. Incredible, I can't thank them enough.” Williams added. “Just really proud to come down here to start the season like this on the front foot and head back to Europe and continue on.”
Williams won the overall classification with nine seconds on Narvaez and 11 seconds on Del Toro Not able to follow the final attacks, Onley dropped from second to fourth place, 20 seconds down, and Simon Yates who finished seventh overall, 33 seconds back.
The points classification was won by triple-stage winner Sam Welsford (Bora-hansgrohe) while the mountains classification went to Luke Burns (Australian National Team). The best young rider jersey went to stage 2 winner, the 20-year-old Del Toro. Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team won the team classification.
How it unfolded
The final stage of the six-day WorldTour race started in the Adelaide suburb of Unley, with the mood through the team cars swinging wildly depending on which patch was being passed. Celebratory upbeat music was pumping out of the Movistar bus as they got prepared for the 128.2km day, though Israel-Premier Tech was a picture of quiet concentration. It was a big day ahead for the team that had ochre within the fold, after Stephen Williams claimed it atop Willunga on stage 5.
Given that Williams was facing up to the final day on the same time as stage 5 winner Oscar Onley (dsm-firmenich PostNL) there was never any doubt that the team would have to stay on its toes. Especially with a line up of riders – including pre-race favourites Simon Yates (Jayco-AlUla) and Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-QuickStep) all within 13 seconds.
The flagged dropped and the action started straight away with KOM points up for grabs early on the sharp climb of Windy Point at 3.8km. Jardi van der Lee (EF Education-EasyPost), in second on the classification with 23 points at the start of the day, moved early and of course, leader Luke Burns (Australian National Team), with 43 points, responded. However that was just the beginning of the action. Chris Harper (Jayco-AlUla) also flew the coop early and claimed top KOM points while Burns was second on the category 1 climb, taking his tally to 49, enough to assure him of the jersey at the end of the stage.
Harper, who is a regular in the role as Simon Yates loyal lieutenant, pulled out the gap to around ten seconds but was quickly pulled back into the fold and then there was another group of riders that again went on the attack, and another, and another.
There were constantly EF Education-EasyPost riders among them, and finally it was Stefan De Bod who got away with Jacopo Mosca (Lidl-Trek) and Gil Gelders (Soudal-QuickStep) at under 110km to go. They were then joined by Simon Geschke (Cofidis), Maurice Ballerstedt (Alpecin-Deceuninck), Antonio Morgado Tomas (UAE Team Emirates) and Franck Bonnamour (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale). The gap had stretched to around three minutes at the 93km mark and the group of seven kept working together.
The first pass over Mount Lofty and the gap held, but then the pace kicked up, with Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers) at the front of the peloton and quickly helping make a solid impact. By the second pass of Mount Lofty, at 30km to go, it was instead around the minute mark.
At ten kilometres to go, with the road starting to turn upwards the gap was holding at around 30 seconds, with Ineos Grenadiers chasing for Jhonatan Narvaez who started the day in third spot overall with a five-second gap to leader Williams.
At around seven kilometres to go, there was a crash in the field, with around ten riders not too far back from the front coming down. It wasn’t enough of a disruption, however, to reel in the inevitable catch, which came at 4km.
Results
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