Peter Sagan (Liquigas-Cannondale) won the fourth stage of the Giro di Sardegna (Tour of Sardinia) between Lanusei and Oristano, taking his third victory out of four stages so far. Where yesterday’s victory came at the top of a 2nd category climb though, today’s came at the front of a bunch sprint. The Slovakian bear Manuel Belletti (Colnago-CSF Inox) into second place, with Roberto Ferrari (Androni Giocattoli) in third.
The day’s breakaway came from Arkimedes Arguelyes (Katusha) and Jonathan McCarty (Spidertech p/b C10), who escaped the peloton’s clutches after just 8km. Over the hilly first half of the 174km stage the two riders were allowed to build an advantage of 7 minutes; at the 100km point though, under the leadership of the Acqua & Sapone team, the gap was reduced to 6 minutes and kept on falling as the race approached the flat final 40km.
With the breakaway duo’s advantage continuing to fall the Farnese Vini-Neri team came forward to assist Acqua & Sapone and by the 130km point it had reduced to just 2’30”.
Once on the flat roads of the stage’s closing kilometres the peloton began to eat up the remaining advantage that Arguelyes and McCarty held. By the 20km to go point it was down to 40 seconds and they were finally caught with 10km, having led the race for more than 150km.
With the break caught the Liquigas-Cannondale came to the front of the peloton, both to protect Sagan’s overall lead and to lead him out into the sprint. With the pace kept incredibly fast there were no further breakaways and Sagan showed his versatility by taking the victory ahead of Belletti and Ferrari.
Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre-ISD) took the best victory of his season so far with fifth place.
The time bonus on the line for Sagan’s victory mean that the Slovakian increases his lead over stage twp winner Damiano Cunego (Lampre-ISD) to 14 seconds with just one day to go.
Result stage 4
1. Peter Sagan (Svk) Liquigas-Cannondale
2. Manuel Belletti (Ita) Colnago-CSF Inox
3. Roberto Ferrari (Ita) Androni Giocattoli
4. Francesco Masciarelli (Ita) Astana
5. Alessandro Petacchi (Ita) Lampre-ISD
6. Alexander Porsev (Rus) Katusha
7. Jacopo Guarnieri (Ita) Liquigas-Cannondale
8. Luca Fioretti (Ita) Ora Hotels-Carrera
9. Danilo Napolitano (Ita) Acqua & Sapone
10. Thomas Geraint (GBr) Great Britain
Standings after stage 4
1. Peter Sagan (Svk) Liquigas Cannondale
2. Damiano Cunego (Ita) Lampre-ISD @ 14s
3. José Serpa Perez - Androni Giocattoli @ 16s
4. Emanuele Sella - Androni Giocattoli @ 28s
5. Ben Hermans (Bel) RadioShack @ 32s