Tour of Britain

Gediminas Bagdonas (An Post-Sean Kelly) bags sprint victory into Sandringham

Stage 7: Bury St Edmunds – Sandringham 200km

The An Post-Sean Kelly team landed the biggest win of its season in the Tour of Britain today, with its most successful rider Gediminas Bagdonas taking the stage in a tight sprint into Sandringham.

Bagdonas took the biggest win of his career in some style today, going clear in a six-man breakaway just after the start of the 200km stage and beating his fellow escapees in the tightest of sprints at the finish.

The Lithuanian, who has won the An Post Ras and the Tour de l’Oise this year, may have only just about edged outBritain’s Ian Wilkinson (Edura Racing), but he still had enough time to get his two hands in the air for a clearly delighted victory salute.

The 25-year-old was confident of winning the sprint and countered the attacks from all of his fellow escapees in the closing kilometres of today’s stage.

He had earlier taken all three hot spot sprints and moves into second in that classification behind team mate Pieter Ghyllebert, who now has so many points he cannot be caught.

To add to a very strong performance by An Post-Sean Kelly today, Andrew Fenn was narrowly beaten in the bunch sprint for seventh place on the stage, edged out only by Mark Cavendish (HTC-Highroad).

Bagdonas said it was a great day for him personally and for the team.

“I’m very happy today. I win a big race and my team did really well today. It’s very important for me to win today and for the people at home inLithuania. Tomorrow I will be going for the time trial.  Today I had good legs, so I will go for it tomorrow.”

An Post-Sean Kelly’s sprints classification leader Pieter Ghyllebert, who has won the competition as long as he finishes tomorrow, said he was very happy with his team’s defence of his jersey.

“Tomorrow, I am going to go easy in the time trial I think and then going to give everything I have for the last stage. It’s a big Tour and I have the jersey since stage one and I think for me to hold it for seven days; it’s very nice.”

An Post-Sean Kelly manager Kurt Bogaerts said he was delighted with the team’s performance, which was also rewarded today with the stage team prize.

“I said before the race that we had a couple of stages in mind that were possible to win, and this was one. Bagdonas is a great rider, he’s a big guy and he’s just so strong.”

“With a few kilometres to go I knew the six weren’t going to be caught and I thought he had a great chance to win. We’ve had a good year, but this is one of the best results of the season.”

“There are a lot of top riders taking part in this race so it really is a special result. Let’s not forget Pieter Ghyllebert holds onto his sprints jersey too and hopefully he will win that now, so overall we’ve done really well so far.”

Today the escapees pulled out a gap of almost seven minutes before the chase behind – led by the Rabobank team of GC leader Lars Boom – became urgent.

However, the six-strong breakaway doggedly hung on and still had 1:23 in hand by the finish. Boom retains his overall lead going into the last day of racing tomorrow.

Of the three Irish riders in the Tour of Britain: Ronan McLaughlin (An Post-Sean Kelly) finished 66^th today just a few seconds off the main peloton; Matt Brammeier (HTC-Highroad) was just behind him in 70^th, having helped lead out Cavendish for the points on offer for seventh place; Mark Cassidy (An Post-Sean Kelly) was a little further back, coming home in a group just under three minutes behind the peloton.

The Tour of Britain finishes inLondontomorrow with an individual time trial in the morning and a criterium in the afternoon.

An Post-Sean Kelly’s Gediminas Bagdonas in full flight in today’s Tour of Britain

An Post’s McLaughlin finishes in Sandringham

An Post-Sean Kelly’s Gediminas Bagdonas celebrates his win on the podium.

Result: Stage 7

1 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 4:33:17  

2 Ian Wilkinson (GBr) Endura Racing

3 Mathieu Claude (Fra) Team Europcar

4 Stijn Neirynck (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator

5 Richard Handley (GBr) TeamRaleigh0:00:04

6 Wouter Sybrandy (Ned) Sigma Sport – Specialized 0:00:11

7 Mark Cavendish (GBr) HTC-Highroad 0:01:23

8 Andrew Fenn (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly    

9 Giacomo Nizzolo (Ita) Leopard Trek

10 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Procycling

11 Tobyn Horton (GBr) Motorpoint

12 Joost Posthuma (Ned) Leopard Trek

13 Robert Förster (Ger) UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling

14 Iker Camano Ortuzar (Spa) Endura Racing

15 Thomas Murray (GBr) Sigma Sport – Specialized

16 Julian Dean (NZl) Team Garmin-Cervelo

17 Jan Barta (Cze) Team NetApp

18 Liam Holohan (GBr) TeamRaleigh

19 Lars Boom (Ned) Rabobank Cycling Team

20 Mark McNally (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly    

66 Ronan McLaughlin (Irl) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:01:38  

70 Matthew Brammeier (Irl) HTC-Highroad     0:01:45

73 Pieter Ghyllebert (Bel) An Post – Sean Kelly    

79 Mark Cassidy (Irl) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:04:13  

Sprint 1 – Ipswich, 44.3km

1 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 5 pts

2 Richard Handley (GBr) TeamRaleigh3

3 Wouter Sybrandy (Ned) Sigma Sport – Specialized 2

4 Stijn Neirynck (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator 1

Sprint 2 – Diss, 89.8km

1 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 5 pts

2 Stijn Neirynck (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator 3

3 Richard Handley (GBr) TeamRaleigh2

4 Ian Wilkinson (GBr) Endura Racing 1

Sprint 3 – Wymondham, 116.8km

1 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 5 pts

2 Stijn Neirynck (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator 3

3 Wouter Sybrandy (Ned) Sigma Sport – Specialized 2

4 Mathieu Claude (Fra) Team Europcar 1

Mountain 1 – Lavenham Hill (Cat. 3) 12.2km

1 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 4 pts

2 Ian Wilkinson (GBr) Endura Racing 3

3 Stijn Neirynck (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator 2

4 Mathieu Claude (Fra) Team Europcar 1

Mountain 2 – Christchurch Park (Cat. 3) 46.9km

1 Stijn Neirynck (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator 4 pts

2 Wouter Sybrandy (Ned) Sigma Sport – Specialized 3

3 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 2  

4 Richard Handley (GBr) TeamRaleigh1

Mountain 3 – Framsden (Cat. 3) 63.1km

1 Richard Handley (GBr) Team Raleigh 4 pts

2 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 3  

3 Mathieu Claude (Fra) Team Europcar 2

4 Wouter Sybrandy (Ned) Sigma Sport – Specialized 1

Teams

1 An Post – Sean Kelly 13:42:37  

2 Endura Racing

3 Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator

General Classification

1 Lars Boom (Ned) Rabobank Cycling Team 24:47:58

2 Leopold Konig (Cze) Team NetApp 0:00:28

3 Daniel Lloyd (GBr) Team Garmin-Cervelo 0:00:29

4 Linus Gerdemann (Ger) Leopard Trek 0:00:31

5 Stephen Cummings (GBr) Sky Procycling 0:00:32

6 Jan Barta (Cze) Team NetApp

7 Jelle Wallays (Bel) Topsport Vlaanderen – Mercator

8 Jonathan Tiernan-Locke (GBr) Rapha Condor – Sharp

9 Iker Camano Ortuzar (Spa) Endura Racing 0:00:50

10 Joost Posthuma (Ned) Leopard Trek 0:00:52

11 Michael Rogers (Aus) Sky Procycling 0:01:16

12 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Procycling 0:01:49

13 Boy Van Poppel (Ned) UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling 0:01:51

14 Bertjan Lindeman (Ned) Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team 0:01:54

15 Mark Cavendish (GBr) HTC-Highroad 0:02:11

16 Andrew Fenn (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly    

17 Bram Tankink (Ned) Rabobank Cycling Team 0:02:14

18 Dominic Klemme (Ger) Leopard Trek 0:02:16

19 Dan Craven (Nam) Rapha Condor – Sharp 0:02:25

20 Rory Sutherland (Aus) UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling 0:02:36

34 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:09:16  

59 Ronan McLaughlin (Irl) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:14:43  

61 Pieter Ghyllebert (Bel) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:14:52

74 Matthew Brammeier (Irl) HTC-Highroad 0:17:19  

75 Mark McNally (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:17:34  

80 Mark Cassidy (Irl) An Post – Sean Kelly 0:28:22  

Points classification

1 Lars Boom (Ned) Rabobank Cycling Team 52 pts

2 Mark Cavendish (GBr) HTC-Highroad 49

3 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Procycling 47

8 Andrew Fenn (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly 25  

15 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 15  

Sprint classification

1 Pieter Ghyllebert (Bel) An Post – Sean Kelly 36 pts

2 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 15  

5 Mark McNally (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly 10  

6 Andrew Fenn (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly 10   

30 Mark Cassidy (Irl) An Post – Sean Kelly 1  

Mountains classification

1 Jonathan Tiernan-Locke (GBr) Rapha Condor – Sharp 71 pts

2 Russell Hampton (GBr) Sigma Sport – Specialized 48

3 Stephen Cummings (GBr) Sky Procycling 30

6 Pieter Ghyllebert (Bel) An Post – Sean Kelly 19  

12 Andrew Fenn (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly 12  

15 Gediminas Bagdonas (Ltu) An Post – Sean Kelly 9  

16 Mark McNally (GBr) An Post – Sean Kelly 9  

37 Ronan McLaughlin (Irl) An Post – Sean Kelly 3