João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) began to turn the tide on stage 4 of the Tour de Suisse with a 49-kilometre solo victory, mounting the first part of his GC comeback on the mountainous route into Piuro, Italy.
The Portuguese rider was led out on the Splügenpass climb, with his UAE team mopping up the remnants of the breakaway, before Jan Christen provided two final turns and Almeida pushed on alone, increasing the pressure.
He didn't blast away from his rivals, but gradually rode them off the wheel with 1.8km of the category 1 climb remaining. Oscar Onley (Picnic-PostNL) and Felix Gall (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) were the last two to get dropped.
With most of the final 50km being on downhill roads, Almeida worked well to maintain a gap to the line. His GC rivals' failure to cooperate behind allowed him to stay out in front over the final drag up to the line, with an eventual winning margin of 40 seconds to Onley and O'Connor, who attacked together from the chase group in the final 7km.
Pre-stage race leader Romain Grégoire (Groupama-FDJ) was dropped on the 8.8km climb, but fought back valiantly on the descent to catch the main chase group that contained the likes of Kévin Vauquelin (Arkéa-B&B Hotels), his closest competitor on GC at the start.
The Frenchman kept hold of the yellow jersey, albeit losing a 1:10 to Almeida at the line ahead of another tough mountain stage on Thursday.
Despite the big gain, Almeida's poor start to the race, when he lost more than three minutes on stage 1, leaves him with a 2:07 deficit still to make up to Grégoire on the final four stages, if he is to defend UAE's title in Switzerland.
"It was a hard effort, really good teamwork, and it's nice to finish it off," said Almeida, who wasn't so bullish on a GC fightback, but will certainly be on the attack again on Thursday.
"Yeah, there's still a long way to go, a lot of time to get back, but I'm happy with the stage win and we will go and enjoy this one.
"I have to disagree [on being the favourite now], because for me, it's up to me to take time back and it's going to be a super hard task, but we never give up. Well, I need to try; if I don't try, we will never know."
With a brutal stage to Santa Maria in Calanca awaiting the riders tomorrow, Almeida will be looking for a similarly big gain. Vauquelin needs just 25 seconds on his compatriot to take over the lead, while O'Connor sits well-placed thanks to his stage 4 gain, with just 56 seconds now separating him and the yellow jersey.
How it unfolded
Action on stage 4 of the Tour de Suisse started before the racing kicked off, with Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers) pulling out as a precaution after his crash the day before.
Once normal proceedings were underway, the start in Heiden was followed by an attacking opening fight for the breakaway, with a slightly strange 193.2km route on offer. The highlight of the route was the two categorised climbs that formed one long climbing effort to the category 1 Splügenpass.
The likes of Anthon Charmig (XDS Astana) and Fabio Christen (Q36.5 Pro Cycling) tried unsuccessfully to get away, but Neilson Powless (EF Education-EasyPost) found more joy when he peeled off the front after 45 minutes of rapid racing.
That move fizzled out, though, as did one from Fabio Van Den Bossche (Alpecin-Deceuninck), with average speed in the peloton north of 50 kph for the opening hour.
A three-man move saw the beginnings of the day's break forming, with AJ August (Ineos Grenadiers), Georg Zimmermann (Intermarché-Wanty) and Larry Warbasse (Tudor Pro Cycling) getting up the road ahead of a feed zone.
Five more riders then formed a chase group and eventually made contact with those in front with 104km to go: Powless, Tom Gloag (Visma-Lease a Bike), Sébastien Grignard (Lotto), Marius Mayrhofer (Tudor Pro Cycling) and yesterday's stage winner Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek).
The eight-man group's lead went out as far as 2:45, but Groupama-FDJ and Picnic PostNL were among those who worked on the front to keep things close on stage 4.
As they climbed to Sufers and approached the 8.8km Splügenpass with its average gradient of 7.4%, the break split, with the stronger climbers going ahead. Grignard, Warbasse, Mayrhofer and Zimmermann were all dropped by the time the leading quartet reached 63km to go.
Simmons, Gloag and Powless powered on, leaving their fellow anglophone August behind, but the fragmented peloton was closing in quickly, only 16 seconds behind the leader 54km from the finish.
UAE Team Emirates-XRG pushed on aggressively, looking to both help Felix Großschartner's ambitions, but also launch João Almeida back up the overall standings after his disappointing opening stage. This ended the breakaway's day in front, with 6km of the climb still to race.
Almeida was left on his own when Jan Christen ran out of steam after a second bout of pacing, but soon the Portuguese rider proved why he was the pre-race GC favourite.
As he put the hammer down, Gall, Onley and O'Connor tried to hang with him, but dropped quickly under his tempo. With 49km to go, Almeida was solo but far from out of danger, thanks to the 35km of descending that he would be faced with after reaching the crest.
Almeida started the 47km run for home with a 40-second lead over the main eight-rider chase group of GC rivals, with Grégoire at 1:21 over the top. A blessing for the young Frenchman, however, was that he had one of the best descenders in the world with him for company – Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor).
Vauquelin went into the virtual lead of the race at times on the downhill, having started the day just 25 seconds back, even trying to attack on the descent with O'Connor, but contact was then made by the man in yellow.
Into the valley, and everything was back together behind, with 13km to go. The 11 riders now in pursuit of only Almeida didn't cooperate, though, despite being within touching distance of Almeida at 38 seconds.
It became clear he was going to win, with the gap stabilising to 40 seconds at the line for the UAE rider, with Onley and O'Connor being prompted into a late tandem attack to try and make time on those failing to work behind, which worked.
Grégoire survived for another day in yellow, finishing fifth on the day behind Vauquelin in the second chase group, with Almeida not yet being an immediate threat to his GC lead, but the Brit and Australian did take back 26 and 22 seconds respectively on his lead, with Almeida getting 1:10 back thanks to his bonus seconds.
Results
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