Lopez-Lutsenko, Astana power duo conquers Green mountain

February 17 ^th 2018 - 13:17

Astana Pro Team put on a show in the queen stage of the Tour of Oman, with Miguel Angel Lopez (Astana) claiming victory atop Jabal Al Akhdhar after a strong collective outing on Saturday. His teammate Alexey Lutsenko finished second to take the leader’s jersey from the Olympic champion Greg Van Avermaet (BMC Racing Team). The Kazakh team only has one more stage to face en route to the overall victory in the 2018 Tour of Oman.

At the start from Sama’il, a 6km battle led to a 6 man breakaway with Marco Marcato (UAE Team Emirates), Benjamin Declercq (Sport-Vlaanderen Baloise), Pim Ligthart (Roompot-Nederlandse Loterij), Nicholas Schultz (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA), Robin Carpenter and Adam De Vos (Rally Cycling). Their lead rose to 4’20” at km 22 and Vincenzo Nibali’s Bahrain-Merida decided to control the pace en route to Green Mountain.

The Astana show

Astana Pro Team, Team Dimension Data and Fortuneo-Samsic worked with Bahrain-Merida. But the attackers pushed hard and enjoyed a 5’15” lead as the race entered the last 50km. The gap was down to 1’50” when they tackled Green Mountain (5.7km, 10.5%). Robin Carpenter was then able to hold off the pack until 3km to go.

Astana immediately set a hard pace in the climb, so much that only Gorka Izagirre (Bahrain-Merida) was able to follow Miguel Angel Lopez, Alexey Lutsenko and Jan Hirt with 2.5km to go. ‘Superman’ Lopez then took over and led Alexey Lutsenko to the overall lead while claiming victory for himself. Jesus Herrada (Cofidis, Solutions crédits) finished third, 12” behind the Astana duo.