Greg van Avermaet (BMC) finished second on today's second stage of the Tour de Wallonie and took over the overall lead. Vacansoleil's Joost Van Leijen won the 194.4km leg between Wanze and Houffalize, with RadioShack's Ben Hermans in third place. The finishing climb cut holes in the peloton, with smaller groups of four to six riders coming in. This gave Van Avermaet the lead, but he is equal on time with Van Leijen.
After a good leadout into the final corner from his teammtes, Van Avermaet stayed in the slipstream of Alessandro Ballan before going clear with the finish in sight. But on the steep climb he was unable to hold off Van Leijen, who overtook him in the final 200 meters to get the victory. "I tried to win the stage by going early," Van Avermaet said. "The team did very good work to put me in the front and Ballan did a great job. We had a gap, but there was still 500 meters to go."
Van Avermaet already finished fourth on stage that one went from Amay to Banneux, over 152.1 km. Matthieu Ladagnous (FDJ) won that sprint, ahead of Stefan Van Dijk (Verandas Willems) and Nikolai Trussov (Katusha).
On stage one, Van Avermaet went away with Gregory Henderson (Sky Pro Cycling), Mirko Selvaggi (Vacansoleil) and Rudy Rouet (Wallonie-Bruxelles) after seven kilometers. Despite building a four-minute lead, the combination wasn't a good one, BMC Racing Team Assistant Director Rik Verbrugghe said, so he had Van Avermaet drop back and the BMC Racing Team helped with the chase. Mathieu Ladagnous (FDJ) took the stage win in a bunch sprint. "Tomorrow's final climb is really steep," Van Avermaet said. "I hope that I can take some seconds there and have a good GC at this race."
This is exactly what happened and Van Leijen and Van Avermaet were four seconds clear of a five-man group led home by Hermans. Other groups trickled in and Van Avermaet now has the lead, but is equal on time with Van Leijen.
The five-day race continues Monday with the longest stage of the race, 224 kilometers between Sambreville and Perwez.
Results stage two
1. VAN LEIJEN Joost VCD 4h57'00"
2. VAN AVERMAET Greg BMC
3. HERMANS Ben RSH 04"
4. CAMMAERTS Edwig LAN 04"
5. DEGAND Thomas VWA 04"
6. DE WAELE Bert LAN 04"
7. GOLAS Michal VCD 04"
8. TRUSSOV Nikolai KAT 10"
9. MAES Nikolas QST 10"
10. DE KORT Koen SKS 10"
GC after stage two
1 VAN AVERMAET GREG BMC
2 VANLEIJEN JOOST VCD 0:00:00
3 HERMANS BEN RSH 0:00:10
4 GOLAS MICHAL VCD 0:00:14
5 CAMMAERTS EDWIG * LAN 0:00:14
6 DEGAND THOMAS VWA 0:00:14
7 DEWAELE BERT LAN 0:00:14
8 TRUSOV NIKOLAY KAT 0:00:16
9 MAES NIKOLAS QST 0:00:20
10 BARRY MICHAEL SKY 0:00:20