Stage four: Bristol-Swansea     <Main Page >     <Previous Stage>

Billed as the toughest stage ever in a British tour, the day's racing didn't live up to its promise. Perhaps too much hype had scared off the riders. Whatever the reason, this leg through south Wales, featuring four first-category climbs, was slow to come alive and failed to disturb the overall table.

First into Swansea was Lithuanian Raimondas Rumsas of the Polish MROZ team, who took the stage by six seconds from Jens Voigt (Credit Agricole) and Juris Silovs (Team Home-Jack and Jones).

Benoit Joachim finished 22 seconds down to retain the red jersey but saw his leading margin reduced to two seconds over Marc Wauters (Rabobank).

The action started even before the race left Bristol as Jay Sweet (Big Mat) took a £250 prime in memory of local enthusiast Peter Solomon. Sweet kept going and soon had Magnus Backstedt (Credit Agricole) for company. Their attack was destined to last for 79 miles.

Neither Sweet nor Backstedt have any talent for climbing but they romped into a nine-minute lead over a peloton more interested in conserving energy and waiting for the climbs to come.

Thus we had the bizarre sight of two sprinters taking the climbing points over the Tumble (44 miles) and Rhigos (69 miles) before the bunch started to accelerate.

Conditions deteriorated and visibility was down to 20 yards as the leaders descended into Treherbert and Treorchy before heading back into the clouds on the oddly-named Andy Capp, the third first-category climb of the day.

With team cars' headlamps piercing the gloom, a 10-man group went clear of the peloton on the long, straight climb. Before the summit they caught Sweet and Backstedt and spat them out the back.

Red jersey contenders Wauters and Voigt were in the 10-man move, together with Rumsas, but race leader Joachim was stuck in the second group of about 20 riders some 40 seconds down. In the same group were his US Postal team-mates George Hincapie, plus Matt Stephens (Harrods-Sixt), Chris Newton (Linda McCartney), Chris Boardman (Credit Agricole) and Charly Wegelius (Great Britain).

After 25 miles of hard driving, the 20 chasers caught the 11 escapees with just six miles to go. Their arrival was the signal for Nicolai Bo Larsen (Home-Jack and Jones) to make a lone escape.

This lasted until he arrived at Swansea's answer to the Wall of Grammont - Constitution Hill - 200 yards of cobbles rearing up at a 30 per cent gradient.

By the time Larsen was halfway up the hill, he had been swallowed by the group. Suddenly Rumsas emerged from the ruck of heaving, weaving cyclists to open a gap of 10 lengths by the summit - now all he had to do was survive the speed bumps, the winding descent and a chicane before hitting the finishing straight.

He succeeded, holding off Voigt who had also escaped the pack which was led in by Latvian champion Juris Silovs.

The Prutour is Rumsas' fourth stage race in recent weeks - he won the Settimana Bergamasca overall and had stage wins in the Circuit des Mines and Peace Race.

"I'd been warned about Constitution Hill," he said. "We'd all been waiting for it. I don't expect to challenge for the overall as our team started with only four riders, but I will try for another stage win."

Five Britons finished in the first 20 - Newton 11th, Stephens 12th, Wegelius.17th, Boardman 18th and Gethin Butler (Men's Health) 20th. Boardman moved up to 13th overall, one ahead of Newton.

1. Raimondas Rumsas (Lithuania) MROZ 106.4 miles in 4-39-10
2. J. Voigt (Credit Agricole) at 6sec
3. J. Silovs (Home-Jack and Jones) at l4sec
4. P Jonker (Rabobank)
5. L. Lebreton (Big Mat)
6. J. Vaughters (US Postal)
7. M. Wauters (Rabobank)
8. S. Montgomery (Post Swiss) all st
9. B. Joachim (US Postal) at 22sec
10. E. Dekker (Rabobank) at 24sec.
11. C. Newton (Linda McCartney)

Day of the five climbs

SEVERAL British riders and one Irishman made the cut on the 105-mile stage four from Bristol to Swansea - when the five Welsh climbs split the field - but only one Linda McCartney rider made the cut. Worse still the McCartney's David McKenzie missed the move and lost his green points jersey.

The scrap for the top-20 places on this, the hilliest stage, included Chris Newton (Linda McCartney) who finished 11th, national champion Matt Stephens (Harrods) 12th, Ciaran Power (Ireland) 16th, Charly Wegelius (GB) 17th, Chris Boardman (Credit Agricole) 18th, and two Team Men's Health riders, Paul Esposti and Gethin Butler, 19th and 20th respectively.

While both Boardman and Newton had the necessary credentials to make the front group, the rest began the day on a wing and a prayer.

Welshman Esposti said: "They really put the pressure on on the Rhigos. The field completely split. On the Andy Capp climb knew what was coming but I had to ride hard to stay on."

Sean Yates, manager of Linda McCartney, said "I had hoped that McKenzie might have hung on but he didn’t have enough team-mates to help him. Chris Newton was our only guy in front. We've done pretty well up to now. But then again, look at Men's Health - they had two guys in front and they've done nothing abroad [with exception of Butler's victory in Tour of Gaudeloupe.- Ed]."