Julian Alaphilippe (Quick-Step Floors) has shown no sign of slowing down after his successful Tour de France, becoming the first Frenchman since Tony Gallopin in 2013 to win the Clásica Ciclista San Sebastián. Alaphilippe outpowered Bauke Mollema (Trek-Segafredo) in a two-up sprint at the end of Spain’s biggest one-day race on Saturday. The duo broke away on the final climb, then the Frenchman easily outsprinted Mollema, the 2016 winner, for victory. Anthony Roux (Groupama-FDJ), finished third.
Already the winner of the Flèche Wallonne Classic in March, Alaphilippe’s victory in San Sebastián is his eighth this season. It also follows hard on the heels of his two stage wins and King of the Mountains title captured in the recently-concluded Tour de France.
Thanks to his latest victory, Julian Alaphilippe has moved into third overall in the UCI WorldTour individual rankings, pushing Chris Froome (Team Sky) down into fourth. Peter Sagan (BORA-hansgrohe) remains in the lead with 2,684 points, followed by recent Tour de France winner Geraint Thomas (Team Sky) with 2,534 points, with Alaphilippe on 2161 points. Alaphilippe’s win has also boosted Quick-Step Floor’s lead in the UCI WorldTour teams classification, ahead of Team Sky and BORA-hansgrohe.
Reigning German National Champion Pascal Ackermann (BORA-hansgrohe) leads in the Tour de Pologne after winning the first two opening stages in bunch sprints. The Tour de Pologne finishes on Friday.
Tour de Pologne > Saturday August 4th - Friday August 10th
British sprinter Daniel McLay has never been afraid of forging his own path across the world. Born in New Zealand, then raised in Leicestershire in England, the 26-year-old fastman later cut his teeth as an amateur racer in the Lotto-Soudal U23 team in Belgium. In 2014, his breakthrough win was a stage of the Tour de l’Avenir before turning pro for the French UCI Pro Continental Team Bretagne-Séché Environnement in 2015. After snapping up a first pro win in the UCI Africa Tour in a stage of the Tropicale Amissa Bongo in Gabon, as well as completing his maiden Tour de France in 2016 with a series of top-ten bunch sprint places, McLay’s increasingly impressive succession of one-day race victories across Spain and France caught the attention of American UCI WorldTour squad Team EF Education First - Drapac p/b Cannondale. In 2018, McLay signed for the US team, and continues to increase his world-wide racing curriculum including, this week, his first ever participation in the Tour de Pologne.
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