Robbe Dhondt 3rd after attacking Development Team dsm-firmenich PostNL ride

Photo Credit: Melchior PHILIP
The penultimate day of action at Alpes Isère Tour saw another day over rolling terrain and twisting, narrow roads through the French countryside. Setting out with a plan Development Team dsm-firmenich PostNL aimed to make the break. Determined to be represented they followed multiple moves before eventually a six rider group broke clear which featured both Vincent Bodet and Robbe Dhondt.
Working well together out front, the break built up an advantage that peaked at almost five minutes over the hilly terrain before the peloton began to up the pace and reel them back in. However, the attackers put up a great fight, and coming into the last 25 kilometres the gap was at around two minutes. It ticked further down but coming onto the last short but steep climb of the day, Dhondt showed great legs and followed an attack at the head of the group. Forming a new trio out front, they continued to push all the way to the line, while Bodet descending expertly to catch up and sit on to the chasing group. The gap to the peloton was enough that they would battle it out for the sarge win. In sight of the line, Dhondt opened up the sprint and kicked fiercely but his two attacking companions would just come around him at the line; with the young Development Team dsm-firmenich PostNL rider taking a fine third place on the day.
Dhondt expressed: “Today was a really nice day, especially after yesterday because we could have done a much better job there as a team as we lost each other quite a few times and were never really where we should have been. It was quite a wake up call. Today I think we did everything much better. We were really switched on from the start. We were always represented in the break. I wasn’t one of our main guys to be in the break today but I saw we had a little gap and felt good so just kept riding and Vincent jumped over, so that was even better. We really rode quite well together out front and I was really focused on trying to win the stage, I really believed in it. At the end I maybe made a tactical mistake to sprint a bit too early, but that’s always the case afterwards where you think you could do something differently. I think we can be happy with the third place and the team performance, it was a really nice day. I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s stage now and we will try to do our best there again.”
Team dsm-firmenich PostNL coach Joey van Rhee continued: “As a team we’ve been a bit up and down so far at this race. The first day we weren’t on point, then stage two we were much sharper and had Ryan in the break, but yesterday we weren’t on point either. We had a good meeting yesterday again and talked about how we have to fight to be in position, so we made a goal to be in the break this afternoon. In the end today we had Robbe and Vincent in there. Robbe wasn’t really planned to be in there but he was just moving at the front and then it went. It was a nice team effort, especially to get in the break from the guys. I think the third place with Robbe is good for the team and a nice confidence boost for us ahead of tomorrow. Robbe showed good legs today but we have a big, big mountain day next. We’ll continue with the process. Today was a good day, so onto tomorrow where we’ll try our best again.”