Jacopo Guarnieri (Liquigas-Cannondale) won the first part of the split third stage of the Driedaagse De Panne-Koksijde, starting and finishing in De Panne, on a filthy wet day in northern Belgium. The Italian launched his sprint early, after the peloton caught a late attack from Tomas Vaitkus (Astana), and stage 2 winner Denis Galimzyanov (Katusha) came within half a wheel of overcoming him on the line. Jimmy Casper (Saur-Sojasun) finshed third at the end of the tough 111km stage.
Despite the completely flat parcours around the flat lands of the Flemish coast, the rain and wind decimated the peloton, causing it to split into several groups. Several riders fell victim to punctures on the wet roads and the main peloton was steadily whittled down to around 50 riders by the stage’s mid point.
All of the jersey holders, and main contenders made the front group, which was kept under control by the Vacansoleil-DCM team of race leader Lieuwe Westra.
There was a brief flurry of activity with 34km to go as Skil-Shimano took control of the front of the peloton to launch Bert De Backer towards the intermediate sprint in Wilskerke. The Belgian found himself outpaced by Romain Feillu (Vacansoleil-DCM) though, but the 2-second time bonus for second place was enough to give De Backer the race lead on the road.
A crash shortly afterwards saw Dennis Van Winden (Rabobank) and Pim Ligthart (Vacansoleil-DCM) come down heavily. Both remounted and managed to rejoin the peloton without too much trouble.
With 32km to go the Omega Pharma-Lotto team came to the front for stage 1 winner André Greipel; it was soon joined by Cofidis and Vacansoleil-DCM and the pace briefly lifted. No team was willing to commit too early though and the long string of the peloton’s front end widened once more as the pace dropped.
With 29km to go a flurry of small attacks started, almost inevitably involving Sylvain Chavanel (Quick Step), who took his younger brother Sébastien (Europcar) with him. Chavanel senior was considered too dangerous in the overall classification though, and the move was marked by Westra personally.
As the pace settled down again Jens Keukeleire (Cofidis) and Boy Van Poppel (UnitedHealthcare) took their chance to get away and the peloton let them go.
Suddenly Michael Barry (Team Sky) came down in the middle of the peloton; Alexander Kristoff (BMC Racing) crashed onto the grass verge but thankfully nobody else came down, although Matt Brammeier (HTC-Highroad) and Jens Debusschere (OmegaPharma-Lotto) were both delayed and had to chase back to join the main group.
With 20km to go the leading pair of Keukeleire and Van Poppel led by 14 seconds but a large group splintered off the front of the peloton and quickly caught them. The ever-attentive Westra made it across with the group, causing his Vacansoleil-DCM team to move back from the front. Hard work from Brammeier managed to close the gap though.
With 19km to go, shortly before the peloton came back together again CJ Sutton (Sky Procycling) jumped off the front of the lead group. He was joined by Van Winden Keukeleire and Van Poppel but the move was quickly neutralised.
The next attack came from Federico Canuti (Colnago-CSF Inox) with 16km to go; nobody went with the Italian, but on his own he quickly managed to pull out a 12 second lead. HTC-Highroad and OmegaPharma-Lotto were now collaborating on the front of the peloton though, and, although his advantage increased slightly over the course of the next kilometre, the lone Italian’s days looked numbered.
On the arrow straight roads through Koksijde, as Canuti approached the finish line, and the start of the 9km finishing circuit, the peloton had him in full view but allowed him to hang on to his 17-second advantage with 10km to go.
As he crossed the line to start the finishing circuit Canuti led by 22 seconds.
Tramlines in the road a the beginning of the circuit thankfully only claimed one victim as Said Haddu (Europcar), positioned almost in last wheel, hit them and came down. The peloton was beginning to get strung out by now in pursuit of Canuti and so was thankfully narrow enough to pass the tramlines by.
Although it was now HTC-Highroad on the front, riding for Mark Renshaw, Canuti’s lead was only slowly coming down. While the peloton still had him in sight, the Italian managed to hold his advantage well over the middle part of the lap; with 3km to go it had been reduced to just 9 seconds though and, although the faces of the HTC-Highroad team betrayed the effort it was requiring they pulled him back with 2km to go
Just before the capture of Canuti, Andriy Grivko (Astana) attacked. He quickly passed the fading Italian and was joined by teammate Tomas Vaitkus, Sébastien Chavanel and Van Poppel. The group was just to be a launch pad for Vaitkus though, as he launched an even stronger attack with just over a kilometre to go.
The sprinters' teams were still organised on the front to the peloton but the Ukrainian seemed to be holding them off; with just 100m to go though, the sprinters flew past him.
Guarnieri went early, and almost seemed to have timed it wrong as Galimzyanov came alongside him, but the young Italian held on to take the win by half a wheel.
De Backer takes the overall lead from Westra, thanks to the 2-second intermediate sprint bonus. The final overall classification will be decided in this afternoon’s 14.7km time trial.