28th April – Stage 2: Kemer – Kalkan
Following on from the opening sprint day, stage two in Türkiye presented an opportunity for some teams to make things hard over the main climb of the day before the challenging uphill kick to the line in Kalkan. The early break was caught near the top of the ascent as the peloton split into several groups, with Casper van Uden, Frank van den Broek and Juan Martinez making it over the top at the had of the race to represent Team Picnic PostNL.
From there, other teams kept the pace on to ensure that those behind wouldn’t come back, before the road snaked and undulated its way along the coast. A few attacks made the finale even harder, but it would come down to a reduced group sprint. Van Uden was well positioned by the other two and Van den Broek tried to help bring him further forward as the road kicked up; but the duo just an out of steam and punch to contest on the tricky finale.
Van den Broek said: “I felt good on the bike today. In the peloton it went hard up the main climb of the day into a headwind. Things split there but in the final we were there with Juan and Casper. I think Casper was in a good positon, and I came around him and tried to take him with me in the wheel, but unfortunately he ran out of steam on the tricky uphill finish. I tried to then give it my all but also blew up a bit myself after that. We did everything we could though and I’m looking forward to tomorrow; it should be another exciting finish.”
27th April – Stage 1: Antalya – Antalya
The first day of racing at the Tour of Türkiye saw the peloton take on a predominantly flat route; starting and finishing in Antalya. Team Picnic PostNL set out their stall early into the day with Jacob Bush setting tempo at the head of the bunch behind the breakaway, as the team looked to ultiamtely set up a sprint finish with Casper van Uden in the finale.
The stage was going smoothly for the team until a small crash at 30 kilometres to go saw Van Uden and last lead-out rider Bram Welten go down, but both were able to re-mount and return. From there, the team grouped up and set up their lead-out at the front of the bunch. Positioned well from ten kilometres to go, the sprint train moved up right to the fore ahead of the last corner with roughly one kilometre to go. Unfortunately, Niklas Märkl slid out around the turn which also held up Welten, meaning Van Uden headed into the deep finale on his own. The pace went out from ahead of him and when those that came from behind did so with speed, Van Uden tried to jump onto the wheel but the difference was too much; with the team unable to compete for a top result on the day.
Van Uden said: “It was a bit of a bumpy start today at the Tour of Türkiye, hitting the deck with 30 kilometres to go. We rode a strong final as a group, but made a mistake in the last corner which cost us in the end. We’ll learn from it and come back stronger in the next days and build on the good things we did today!”
