Nicolas Roche battles through the crowds on a savage day in the saddle at the Tour of Britain that saw four Irish riders on the attack (Photo: Tour of Britain)
By Brian Canty
Dan Martin has continued his brilliant run of form after finishing third on stage two of the Tour of Britain today and jumping to third on general classification.
The Irishman is just 58 seconds down on leader and teammate Julian Vermotte who won the race following a superb late attack.
It’s Martins first race back since the Olympics last month but he has clearly taken off where he left off and proved he has what it takes to really push for the win – or stages, this week.
What his role will be for the remainder of the week remains to be seen but given his attacking instincts and ability to sniff out winning moves he could very well be the ace in the Etixx-QuickStep pack yet.
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Today, on the 188-kilometre journey from Carlisle to Kendal it was Belgian Vermotte who proved the strongest.
He was the last remaining survivor from the day’s 15-man break that also included Ryan Mullen (Cannondale-Drapac), Nicolas Roche (Team Sky) and Conor Dunne (JLT Condor).
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Dan Martin celebrates his teammate Julian Vermotte's victory on stage two of the Tour of Britain today. The Irishman also produced a top performance to take third against some serious sprinters and move up to third overall (Photo: Tour of Britain)
Also in the escape were Johann Van Zyl (Dimension Data), Loic Vliegen (BMC), Miguel Angel Benito (Caja Rural), Hector Saez (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), Xandro Meurisse (Wanty Groupe Gobert), Jochem Hoekstra, Martijn Tusveld (botj Giant-Alpecin), Tom Leezer, Bert-Jan Lindeman (both LottoNL-Jumbo), Marco Coledan and Jacopo Mosca (both Trek-Segafredo).
They established a maximum lead of four minutes, while Movistar led the chase behind.
The bunch had them at 1’20” with 50 kilometres to go after which point the attacking started and Roche - in his first race also since the Olympics was very much to the fore.
He managed to stay in the front group that featured his cousin Dan and a host of men who were either part of the initial break or managed to forge their way across from the peloton.
Roche dug very deep on a day that featured 3,700 metres of climbing and he would eventually finish 11th on the stage as well as joint first as leader of the KOM classification.
But because of bonus seconds accumulated while out front he ended the day 10th overall, 1’02” down on Vermotte.
Conor Dunne was over 13 minutes down, Mullen around a minute further back while Damien Shaw (An Post Chain Reaction) was in the same time.
Tomorrow's stage takes the riders 179 kilometres from Congleton to Knutsford and there are three climbs - two category ones, in the latter half of the race.
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