Damien Shaw wreaks havoc in France as An Post make their move
Ireland's Damien Shaw drives the breakaway. It was a huge day for his An Post-Chainreaction team in France.
By Brian Canty
The An Post Chain Reaction team has enjoyed its best day of 2017 so far with victory on stage five of the Tour de Bretagne.
And Damien Shaw bagged another fine result as he set up his team mate for victory.
Polish rider Przemyslaw Kasperkiewicz took a fantastic win over Anders Skaarseth (Team Joker Icopal) with Maxime Cam third.
Damien Shaw 11 seconds back in fifth, having driven the breakaway for much of the stage.
He really put the power down, with the bunch still 1:40 behind at the finish thanks in large part to the efforts of the Irishman.
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The result pushes Shaw up to fifth overall. And with two stages remaining he is just 1’ 24” down on new race leader Cam.
Kasperkiewicz is third at 1’12” while Sean MacKinnon, also of An Post-Chainreaction, is 9th overall at 1’51”.
Przemyslaw Kasperkiewicz won a brilliant fifth stage of the Tour de Bretagne in France today. The Polish rider crossed the line first at the end of the 152-kilometre contest. He is now third on general classification at 1'12" going into the penultimate stage tomorrow.
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Today’s 152-kilometre stage took the riders from Saint Gildas Des Bois to a hard, five-lap finishing circuit at Saint Pern.
The break of the day featured six riders who managed to escape after the first categorised climb, after 34 kilometres.
And they pulled clear of the peloton despite a concerted effort from behind.
As well as the aforementioned Shaw, Kasperkiewicz, Cam and Skaarseth, the break featured Jeremy Cabot (Roubaix Lille Metropole) and Florian Cam.
They didn’t hang about and with 40 kilometres to go they still held a lead of 3’30”.
With one of finishing laps remaining, the gap was trimmed to under two minutes.
The break contested stage honours with Shaw sacrificing his own chances for his team mate to win and move up overall.
It leaves the team in a great position going into the final two days tomorrow and Sunday.
Tomorrow’s sixth stage is a hilly 160 kilometre course between Montanan De Bretagne and Pontivy. There are three category one climbs after 83, 91 and 128 kilometres.
Shaw has already held the climbers’ and combined classification jerseys.
He spent the opening stage in a two-mean break and was only caught 150 metres from the finish.
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