Eddie Dunbar has ended his first race of the new season, taking 6th overall at Tour de la Provence in France.
The young Irishman, riding for Team Ineos, finished safely in the peloton today which was reduced to just over 40 riders after 170.5km of racing on undulating terrain into Aix-en-Provence.
Dunbar (23) had started today's final stage in 6th place, some 2:21 down on race leader Nairo Quintana. The Irish cyclist ended the race after today's stage 4 in the same position.
Quintana seized the leader's jersey with an emphatic win at the end of Saturday's stage 3, which finished at Chalet Reynard on Mont Ventoux; attacking with over 7km to go and riding away from everyone.
Dunbar finished in the second chasing group, placing 5th on the stage and moving into 6th overall after finishing in 6th place on the uphill finish of Friday's stage 2.
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Today's stage went to the breakaway men; a group of four just holding off the reduced peloton with Owain Doull of Team Ineos taking victory.
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Doull won the four-up sprint from Matthias Brändle (Israel Start-Up Nation), Ian Garrison (Deceuninck-Quick Step) and Romain Combaud (NIippo Delko One Provence).
The leading four crossed the line just seconds ahead of the bunch and as all the well-placed riders overall were in the peloton there was no change in the final standings.
Quintana took the title and looks back to his best having transfered from Movistar to Arkéa Samsic during the winter.
He won by 1:04 from Astana's 22-year-old Russian national champion and stage 2 winner Aleksandr Vlasov. Rounding out the podium was Alexey Lutsenko (Astana), at 1:28.
Dunbar rode today's stage in the green jersey of young rider classification leader as Vlasov, who was leading that contest, was also the leader of the points classification.
As well as his 6th and 5th places on stages and 6th overall, Dunbar was also 2nd in the young rider classification.
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