Volta a Catalunya: Axel Laurance wins stage 5 sprint with bike throw

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Axel Laurance (Alpecin-Deceuninck) cashed in on stage 5 of the Volta a Catalunya, beating Marijn van den Berg (EF Education-EasyPost) and Bryan Coquard (Cofidis) in a hectic bunch sprint in Viladecans.

The victory is the 22-year-old's second win of the season after a stage in the Ètoile de Bessèges, and his first at the WorldTour level in his debut season in the top tier.

"It's really amazing. It's my first year in the WorldTour team, so to be able to win a stage in a WorldTour race in my first year at the WorldTour is really nice for sure," Laurance said.

Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) put another stage behind him in the lead of the Volta a Catalunya, even mixing it up briefly with the sprinters in the final 500 metres before wisely sitting up.

With two more stages, he leads the overall, points and mountains classification.

Mikel Landa (Soudal-Quickstep) finished safely in the bunch to hold his second place overall at 2:27, while Aleksandr Vlasov (Bora-Hansgrohe) remains third at 2:55.

Pogačar dominated the summit finishes on stages 2 and 3 but said today's stage was tougher.

"I think it was one of the hardest of all stages until now - it was one of the most attacking-wise. It was exciting racing until the final, and I'm happy it's over."

He now faces the final two rather unpredictable stages - a shorter summit finish at Queralt with five major climbs on Saturday and the punchy circuits in Barcelona to close out the race.

"I'm looking forward to tomorrow's stage. It's one big question mark all over it because there are very steep climbs and a lot of climbing in a short period of time. It's going to be really aggressive from the start, and a lot can happen."

How it unfolded

The 167.3km fifth stage of the Volta a Catalunya from Altafulla to Viladecans featured two category 2 climbs - the Coll de les Ventoses after 64.9km of racing and the Alt de la Creu d'Aragall with 30km to go.

There was an intense battle to make the breakaway, with Herold Tejada (Astana) and Idar Andersen (Uno-X) kicking things off from the flag drop. When they were caught, a group of six clipped away, with three more scrambling across.

Although Geraint Thomas (Ineos Grenadiers) was the best-ranked at 8:08 from leader Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates), the escape group boomeranged and with 40km down, the peloton was all back together.

The situation remained the same through the intermediate sprint, where Garcia Cortina claimed the three-second time bonus with teammate Enric Mas just behind, taking two seconds, and Sepp Kuss (Visma-Lease a Bike) securing one second.

Then, it was on to the Coll de les Ventoses, still all together, when Attila Valter (Visma-Lease a Bike) led over the top. Then, his teammate Steven Kruijswijk leapt away on the uncategorised climb that followed - but he too was brought back immediately.

On the descent, five riders got away and the breakaway finally was clear with 85km to go.

The quintet included Oscar Rodríguez (Ineos Grenadiers), Jacopo Mosca (Lidl-Trek), Enzo Paleni (Groupama-FDJ), Georg Steinhauser (EF Education-EasyPost) and Christopher Juul-Jensen (Jayco-AlUla).

They gained 2:30 on race leader Pogačar and, despite Paleni being the highest of the five in the GC, more than 29 minutes behind Pogačar, the peloton kept that gap to the maximum, and it came down along with the terrain.

Speaking of Paleni, he had a problem with his shoe and had to change it on the fly while being held by his team mechanic in the car, but the breakaway was otherwise unremarkable.

Their advantage fell below one minute as they approached the final ascent of the Alt de la Creu d'Aragall, a 6.5km climb that pitches up to 13% in places.

Steinhauser attacked into the base of the climb, shattering the breakaway. Rodríguez continued to chase and joined the EF rider midway into the ascent, but the gap to the peloton tumbled to 17 seconds.

After Rodríguez led over the climb, the bunch swept past the duo, who surrendered with a fist bump before settling back into the slipstream.

Valter attacked with 14km to go, but the bunch quickly brought him back. Then, Valentin Paret Peintre attacked, drawing away five riders. Sensing the danger, more riders tried to bridge, and soon there were eight leaders, but they could not resist the pace of the chasing peloton.

A reduced peloton bunched up behind Israel-Premier Tech, waiting for the sprint. With the easing of pace, the rest of the bunch rejoined with 5km to go.

Alpecin-Deceuninck led into the finish, with race leader Pogačar staying close to the front. Van den Berg tried to make it two, but Laurance held on by a slim margin to win the stage.

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