After Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek) snatched four bonus seconds on stage 2 of Paris-Nice and built a slim lead over his GC rivals, Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) didn’t fret as he commented at the finish, saying how “there aren’t many races that are decided in four seconds.”
With Tuesday’s team time trial completed at the French stage race, the gap between them is now 17 seconds and surely more worrying for the Dane, whose team looked strong when they set the provisional fastest time, but were ultimately well beaten by the German team and stage winners Ineos Grenadiers.
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Ayuso moved into the leader’s yellow jersey, and he now holds a narrow lead over Ineos’ two GC options, Kévin Vauquelin two seconds down and Oscar Onley three seconds back. Having finished fifth and fourth, respectively, behind Ayuso at the Volta ao Algarve, they sit as his closest challengers.
Of the GC hopefuls, Vingegaard and young teammate Davide Piganzoli sit the next highest overall, both 17 seconds down, and the Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe duo of Aleksandr Vlasov and Dani Martínez are also within striking distance at 22 seconds down.
Other remaining riders hoping to impress overall will have to rely more on their climbing legs to get a top GC result out of Paris-Nice, with rising Spanish talent Iván Romeo also 30 seconds down and Frenchman Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious) sat 1:06 in arrears after the TTT.
Where the race will be won
“There are…
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