Mathieu van der Poel took over as the Tour of Britain‘s overall leader after winning Tuesday’s fourth stage from Gateshead to Kendal.
The Dutchman made his move on a sharp rise in the closing stages of the 173.2km stage.
He tracked the three-rider breakaway before blowing away the rest of the reduced field, with Jasper De Buyst (Lotto Soudal) and Simon Clarke (EF Education First) following him home and completing the podium.
Matteo Trentin (Mitchelton-Scott) finished in ninth place and conceded his race lead. Van der Poel is ahead by a second.
“It was a bit of gamble because I didn’t really know where the finish line was,” Van der Poel said of his push to the finish line.
“I got bumped in yesterday and I didn’t want that to happen again today, so I went full gas 300 metres to go. It was a bit far but got I got a gap and the final 100m was a bit easier.
“It’s really nice to win this stage. It was a really, really hard stage, with lots of climbing.”
Tour of Britain 2019 – stage 4 results (Gateshead – Kendal):
| 1 | Mathieu van der Poel (Corendon-Circus) | 4:23:08 |
| 2 | Jasper De Buyst (Lotto Soudal) | +03” |
| 3 | Simon Clarke (EF Education First) | ,, |
| 4 | Ben Swift (Team Ineos) | ,, |
| 5 | Amund Grøndahl Jansen (Jumbo – Visma) | ,, |
| 6 | Tom Van Asbroeck (Israel Cycling Academy) | ,, |
| 7 | Xandro Meurisse (Wanty-Gobert) | ,, |
| 8 | Ben Hermans (Israel Cycling Academy) | ,, |
| 9 | Matteo Trentin (Mitchelton-Scott) | ,, |
| 10 | Tiesj Benoot (Lotto Soudal) | ,, |
Tour of Britain 2019 – general classification after stage 4:
| 1 | Mathieu van der Poel (Corendon-Circus) | 17:36:27 |
| 2 | Matteo Trentin (Mitchelton-Scott) | +01” |
| 3 | Jasper De Buyst (Lotto Soudal) | +07” |
| 4 | Simon Clarke (EF Education First) | +14” |
| 5 | Mike Teunissen (Jumbo-Visma) | +15” |
| 6 | Ben Swift (Team Ineos) | +19” |
| 7 | Amund Grøndahl Jansen (Jumbo – Visma) | ,, |
| 8 | Thomas Sprengers (Sport Vlaanderen-Baloise) | ,, |
| 9 | Nils Politt (Katusha-Alpecin) | ,, |
| 10 | Andrey Amador (Movistar) | ,, |
