Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step) clocked a time of 41:49″ on the 34.4km time trial course to beat Josh Tarling (Ineos Grenadiers) by 17 seconds and Primož Roglič (Bora-hansgrohe) by 39 seconds in stage 4.
Evenepoel was pleased afterwards. “I’m very proud and happy, and my team around me, my family, the staff members, can be really proud of all the support they gave me. It has been quite a long way, three weeks with almost no bike, and only four weeks of training.”
“Being at this level already is a good sign towards the Tour, and in my preparation,” said Evenepoel. “I can only be happy and proud of what I did today, and now we focus day by day.”
Runner-up Josh Tarling (Ineos Grenadiers) was hopeful for a win while he waited for Evenepoel to finish. “It felt slow. It’s the tarmac that’s quite grippy, so it felt hard to get the speed up, especially over the top of the climbs. I think I did a decent enough ride, so fingers crossed.”
Primož Roglič was satisfied with his first ride on his new TT bike. “I’m happy. I stayed on the bike, so that is an improvement compared to yesterday. It was my first long time trial on the new bike at BORA-hansgrohe and that was quite something. It’s quite a change, but I’m happy with how the ride went for me.”
Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike) gave it his all, placing fourth, 1:07″ behind Evenepoel. “I suffered a lot. I gave it my best effort. I wasn’t really checking power, I was going by feel. It was really long so there was a lot of suffering, but I think I did a good ride.”
RESULTS
Stage 4: Saint-Germain-Laval > Neulise (34.4km)
Results powered by FirstCycling.com
