Tour de Yorkshire: Team Sky’s Lars Petter Nordhaug hangs on to victory

Yorkshire came out in force for the third and final stage

(Getty)

Belgian Ben Hermans won the third and final stage of the inaugural Tour de Yorkshire as Team Sky’s Lars Petter Nordhaug hung on to secure overall victory in Leeds yesterday.

BMC Racing’s Hermans attacked with just over six miles remaining of the rolling 103-mile course from Wakefield to Leeds, soon sweeping by the fading solo effort of American Lawson Craddock (Giant-Alpecin) and quickly building a 20-second lead on the way into the finish in Roundhay Park.

That was enough to secure the stage win by a final margin of nine seconds as the peloton behind squabbled over the general classification places, with Nordhaug able to stay with the secondary group and maintain his lead.

In the final standings, the Norwegian won by 11 seconds from BMC’s Samuel Sanchez and Thomas Voeckler of Europcar.

Team Sky’s Irish rider Philip Deignan finished fifth overall, 24 seconds back on his team-mate.

Once again, the Yorkshire public turned out in huge numbers despite a poor forecast and the occasional shower along the way, with the route lined almost from start to finish and only a narrow path clearing for the riders on the biggest climb of the day to the Cow and Calf above Ilkley.

Sir Bradley Wiggins, enjoying something of a lap of honour as he winds down his road racing career, started the day more than 15 minutes down in the general classification and was again well off the back as the leaders crossed the line.

Wiggins, who takes on the Hour Record in four weeks’ time, said it was “good for the sport” that it was broken by Alex Dowsett on Saturday – and he remains confident that he will set another mark at the Lee Valley Velodrome in London.

He said: “It is brilliant for Alex. It also builds hype for my attempt. I hope that if I break it then someone else comes along.”

Chris Froome’s build-up to the Tour de France remains on track after he finished third overall in the six-day Tour of Romandie. The Team Sky rider finished 13th in the time trial over a rain-soaked 11-mile course in Lausanne, Switzerland on the last day.

Ilnur Zakarin of Russia was the overall winner by placing third in the time-trial, 13 seconds slower than former time-trial world champion Tony Martin of Germany despite changing his bike because of technical problems.

The 25-year-old Katusha rider retained the leader’s yellow jersey by 17 seconds from teammate Simon Spilak of Slovenia. Spilak was second fastest in the time trial, coming 11 seconds behind Martin’s mark of 23 minutes, 17 seconds. “I’m very happy. Thank you to my team,” Zakarin said.

Mark Cavendish won the sprinter’s jersey at the Tour of Turkey but was unable to claim victory in the final stage. The Briton finished second in the 75-mile final stage, which was won by Lluis Bonet Mas of Spain.

Cavendish, who won eight of the race’s 12 stages, said: “I’m super happy with getting the green jersey at the end. I would have liked to win the stage today, but we tried our hardest. Lluis went really strong at the end and I’m pleased we could finish on the podium.”

Cavendish now plans to race the Tour of California, the Tour de Suisse and British Championships before this year’s Tour de France.