UAE Team Emirates once again showed their strength at the Tour de Suisse as Adam Yates and João Almeida crossed the line together to finish one-two at the race’s final mountain stage at Villars-sur-Ollon.
The pair, already lying first and second in the overall standings, proved the strongest from the elite GC group on the concluding climb of the 118km stage, going clear inside the final 2km and crossing the line side-by-side in a decisive victory.
Matthew Riccitello (Israel-Premier Tech) came home in third place at 14 seconds down to continue his impressive week, while Wilco Kelderman (Visma-Lease A Bike) led home a group of further GC men – including Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek), Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers), and Tom Pidcock (Ineos Grenadiers) at 16 seconds.
“You see, then, he’s such a nice guy,” Yates said of Almeida after the stage. “When we got away at the end there, we said what we should do. I asked him if I could have the stage, and he said yes, straight away. It just showed the character he is. He’s such a nice guy and he’s in such great condition that he could easily win himself.
“To have that is a great quality, not just as a bike rider but as a person, so chapeau to him.”
The stage result brings Yates’ GC lead over Almeida to 31 seconds ahead of the final stage on Sunday, a largely uphill 15.7km time trial from Aigle to Villars-sur-Ollon. Bernal, Skjelmose, and Riccitello fill out the top 5 at 1:51, 2:50, and 3:02 down respectively.
Despite his GC lead, Yates is expected to miss out on the overall win, with Almeida the favourite to take over and score the big victory in Sunday’s time trial. Yates said his teammate will likely take “almost a minute” on him during the 15.7km closer.
“I think for me personally as well, tomorrow’s time trial, he’s going to put almost a minute into me, so I’m sure you’ll see him on this chair tomorrow,” he said.
“I think he’s shown in the last few days how strong he is when he starts doing his crazy pace. When he’s alone tomorrow in the TT, I think he’s going to fly up here. So, we’ll see tomorrow, and then hopefully we can win again.”
How it unfolded
The penultimate stage of the 2024 Tour de Suisse would bring with it the final test for the riders and a high-mountain circuit race with four major climbs along the way, including the first-category run to the finish at Villars-sur-Ollon (7.9km at 7.7%).
The opening climb of the day, the Col de la Croix (3.8km at 8.8%), came right at the start of the 118km stage, and saw the day’s break get away after a flurry of attacks at the front of the peloton.
Sylvain Moniquet (Lotto-Dstny) led the way over the top and was joined in the move by seven other men – his teammate Maxim Van Gils, plus Harold López (Astana Qazaqstan), Finlay Pickering (Bahrain Victorious), Einer Rubio (Movistar), Valentin Paret-Peintre (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale), Jan Christen (UAE Team Emirates), and Johannes Staune-Mittet (Visma-Lease A Bike).
Back in the peloton, Ineos Grenadiers took charge of the pacemaking, holding the break’s advantage to the two-minute mark on the long descent to Aigle and the valley roads. In between the groups, Raúl García Pierna (Arkéa-B&B Hotels) was alone in the chase, but he gave up the ghost just as the next climb of the day started, 70km out.
There, it was the riders’ first chance to check out the closing first-category climb to Villars-sur-Ollon, before continuing on uphill to the additional second-category climb of the Col de la Croix.
Ineos kept pushing the pace on the way up, reducing the break’s advantage and ropping some major names along the way, including Cian Uijtdebroeks (Visma-Lease A Bike), and Lenny Martinez (Groupama-FDJ).
Up front, it was Lotto-Dstny setting the pace with two men in the break before Christen and Paret-Peintre attacked with just over 60km to run, with the peloton following at the top of the climb to Villars-sur-Ollon a minute back.
The move didn’t work, however, with Staune-Mittet quickly countering on the short flat section before the climbing began again on the road up the Col de la Croix. It proved a wise move for the Norwegian, as behind him, the rest of the breakaway riders were getting dragged back by the peloton.
Van Gils, Rubio, and Paret-Peintre held out the longest, but Staune-Mittet was the only man left from the move by the top of the climb, 50km from the finish. The 22-year-old led by 40 seconds at the top, while behind him, Ineos Grenadiers softened the pace and swung off the front.
On the way down, UAE Team Emirates took up the slack as Staune-Mittet added another 30 seconds to his lead. By the bottom of the descent, ahead of another 15km or so in the valley, the gap between the solo survivor and the peloton lay at 1:30, with a total of 22km remaining before the finish line.
At the 10km mark, on the final run to the start of the climbing, Staune-Mittet held a minute on the chase, with Ineos Grenadiers heading to the front once more, taking over from UAE Team Emirates.
The British team chipped away at Staune-Mittet’s advantage over the following kilometres, bringing it to 45 seconds at 8km, 35 at 7km, and 25 at 6km. He’d keep battling on through the Tissot sprint points on the way up to win himself a watch while behind him, Felix Gall (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) kicked off the attacks.
Staune-Mittet’s adventure came to an end at the 3km mark as Gall blew past, while the upping of the pace shattered the chasing GC group even further. An intra-team battle for the race lead at UAE Team Emirates got underway shortly afterwards as João made a move with 3km to go.
He took race leader Yates along with him, as well as Wilco Kelderman (Visma-Lease A Bike), and Matthew Riccitello (Israel-Premier Tech), though the latter duo were dropped as the UAE pair caught and passed Gall.
The finale, then, would be a two-man fight between teammates Almeida and Yates, with the Portuguese rider needing to make up 27 seconds before the closing of Sunday’s time trial to come away with the overall win.
Yates led the way into the final kilometre with Almeida glued to his wheel, while further back, Riccitello and Kelderman led the chase.
In the end, there was no sprint as Yates and Almeida came to the finish together, the yellow jersey crossing the line just ahead of his teammate and adding four seconds to his lead ahead of the decisive 15.7km time trial on Sunday.
Results
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