Luke Rowe wins Herald Sun Tour stage two

CTT

Luke Rowe led a sensational breakaway win on stage two of the Herald Sun Tour to record Team Sky’s second win in the race.

Rowe was in a group of 10 that spent nearly 140km in the lead, before he led a splinter group of four which he then dropped to ride solo to his first win since 2012.

“Last night I already said to Brett that we should try and go for a breakaway so we assigned myself and Yogi (Stannard) to go in the break so it was always the plan to go.”, said Rowe.

“The whole day I was wary of a few guys and there were some excellent climbers in the break and it was just a case of trying to use them up to the best of my advantage and I opened up a decent gap straight away so I enjoyed the last 20km solo.”

After a day of patrolling attacks and controlling the breakaway, Howson’s Orica-Scott teammates were again called upon in the final 20km when the race leader punctured at the bottom of the final climb.

After receiving a replacement front wheel from Mitchell Docker, Howson was in for an all-mighty chase with Chris Froome and other general classification threats pushing hard ahead on the climb.

Thanks to unwavering assistance from Sam Bewley, followed by Robert Power, Simon Gerrans, Michael Hepburn and finally Esteban Chaves to get over the climb, Howson and the Colombian re-joined the group of threats inside the final 500metres.

Herald Sun Tour 2017 – stage 2 results (Mt Beauty – Beechworth):

1	Luke Rowe (Team Sky)	4:08:23
2	Conor Dunne (Aqua Blue Sport)	+33”
3	Tanner Putt (UnitedHealthcare)	+56”
4	Robbie Hucker (IsoWhey Sports SwissWellness)	+57”
5	Steve Lampier (JLT Condor)	,,
6	Cameron Meyer (Australia)	+01’12”
7	Martijn Tusveld (Roompot – Nederlandse Loterij)	+01’17”
8	Janier Acevedo (UnitedHealthcare)	,,
9	Ian Bibby (JLT Condor)	,,
10	Lucas Hamilton (Australia)	,,

General classification after stage 2:

1	Damien Howson (Orica-Scott)	8:46:12
2	Jai Hindley (Australia)	+38”
3	Kenny Elissonde (Team Sky)	+53”
4	Cameron Meyer (Australia)	+01’08”
5	Michael Storer (Australia)	+01’10”
6	Chris Froome (Team Sky)	+01’12”
7	Lucas Hamilton (Australia)	+01’13”
8	Nathan Earle (Australia)	+01’15”
9	Esteban Chaves (Orica-Scott)	,,
10	Timothy Roe (IsoWhey Sports SwissWellness)	+01’17”