Bos is the boss again
Belkin Pro Cycling continued its domination at the Tour of Hainan with top sprinter Theo Bos and race leader Moreno Hofland making a 1-2 in a bunch gallop in Hainan’s capital city Haikou, nicknamed “coconut city”. They preceded French fast man and future Europcar rider Yannick Martinez of La Pomme Marseille and increased Hofland’s lead on GC.
“My intention was to take as many seconds bonus as I could”, Hofland explained after the race. “There were many attacks at the beginning but no breakaway, so I could go for the first two intermediate sprints.” He won them both, ahead of his team-mate Lars Boom and Drapac’s Will Walker at km 30.4 while Fabian Schnaidt of Champion System and Walker again could only see him from behind on the line of km 46.7.
Having bagged six seconds bonus, Hofland was happy to witness a trio going up the road at km 52. Chris Williams (Novonordisk), Elchin Asadov (Synergy Baku) and Hong Kong national champion Cheong King Wai got an advantage of three minutes after 100 kilometres of racing. Asadov being the first of them to give up, Cheong was the last man away but he got reined in fifteen kilometers before the finish in front of the convention centre on the shores of the Haikou Bay.
The sprint was crystal clear with the whole Belkin team leading Bos out at one notable exception. “I was given a free role to sprint behind him”, Hofland explained. “I managed to stay on his wheel, so it’s nice to get some more seconds bonus at the end. I’m gonna try to gain time like that every day and make the gap bigger on GC to see the possibility to win the race overall.”
“This Belkin team is really unbeatable with two very good sprinters”, Martinez noticed. “To finish third behind them is a good performance.. I’m a decent sprinter too but today I wasn’t well positioned, maybe tenth when I had to start sprinting earlier than Bos and Hofland. If I get a better position in the next few days, I might get a better result as well. I’m still motivated to do well at the end of the season even though I know the training camps with Europcar will come quickly after I’ll return home from China.”
