Caleb Ewan Wins People's Classic

13 January 2019 05:26
Lotto Soudal's Caleb Ewan has won the People's Classic race in Australia.The traditional curtain raiser to the Santos Tour Down Under saw a one hour criterium around East End in Adelaide and saw plenty of World Tour riders and some big names taking part.Two crashes defined the race. The first took down plenty of riders with two laps to go and one on the final corner, wrecked it for the sprint trains and left Caleb Ewan to out sprint Peter Sagan and take the win in 1.03.59 ahead of Peter Sagan and Alexander Edmondson with British riders Owain Doull in sixth and his fellow countryman Luke Rowe in seventh.Ewan said to his team's press office: “During the first part of the race I tried to hide safely in the bunch. The last twenty minutes of the race, we moved to the front of the peloton. Hagen and De Gendt did a great job in controlling the early break and the other four Lotto Soudal riders kept me well-positioned at the front of the pack. We were lucky to avoid the big crash which happened just behind my back, so I didn’t see it myself. In the very end of the race, Roger Kluge had to close a little gap before I could launch my sprint. I felt that Sagan was on my wheel but I was confident that I could hold him off.”“It is not an official UCI victory yet but it still is a great feeling to win here, the first time we are racing and preparing the sprint as a complete team. It gives a lot of confidence to conclude this first experience with a win. It is a pity for the guys who crashed because I would’ve loved to sprint head-to-head against them. But for sure that will happen during the Tour Down Under. For now, I’m very satisfied but let’s keep calm. Tuesday, we have to be focused to again make it a sprint finish, hopefully with the same result as today.”.read full article

Source: Kev Monks