30th April – Stage 1: Münchenstein – Fribourg
With Tuesday’s prologue behind them, open road racing returned at Tour de Romandie on Wednesday. Potentially a day for the sprinters, the fast-men in the peloton would need to traverse several hard climbs before a rolling finale. Team Picnic PostNL set out their stall with the joint goal of keeping GC finisher Oscar Onley safe and to go for it in the final with Pavel Bittner.
Controlling the strong breakaway that formed, the pace and heat was on all day and on the last main climb of the afternoon Bittner suffered a puncture and had to let go of the reducing peloton. However, the team worked brilliantly and closed back down a one minute gap to the peloton to return ahead of the finish. Yet, it was a chaotic run-in and on the uncategorised kickers in the closing three kilometres a few teams strung things out, which unfortunately made it difficult to move up. Onley was well to the fore and he followed the wheels well, and coming into the final with a view of the finish gantry he gave it his best kick and sprinted to as solid sixth place on the day.
Onley said: “We committed to the sprint for Pavel today and took control early on. Unfortunately, he punctured over the top of the steep climb and had a big chase back but it was a really big effort from the guys to get him back to the bunch. The team then did a good job positioning myself and Pavel for the final. With the fast descent it was a bit of a hectic run-in and I tried go for it in the sprint as well.”
29th April – Prologue: Saint-Imier – Saint-Imier
A fast 3.4 kilometre prologue around the streets of Saint-Imier got the Tour de Romandie underway on Tuesday afternoon. The technical route had several sharp corners and sections to put the power down on, plus a few short drags along the way. As a result, prologue specialists, sprinters and GC riders were all in the mix come the end of the day.
Team Picnic PostNL GC finisher Oscar Onley set a solid early benchmark but it would be fast-man Pavel Bittner who clocked the team’s best ride of the day. Cutting the timing beam with an effort of four minutes and 39 seconds, Bittner’s effort would ultimately be good enough for 12th place on the stage.
Bittner said: “I’m pretty happy with how things went today. I went into it to try my best today and sent it. In the end it was a quite decent result and a good opener for the next two or three days where there are some possible chances in the sprints. Oscar also really went for it too and did a solid ride in the GC, so overall it was a nice start and I’m excited for the next couple of days.”
