On Milano-Sanremo’s final climb, Peter Sagan stayed close to the front and with 6.5km to go, the attacks came and a group of seven formed and the former world champion was among them.
The seven became eleven at the foot of the Poggio’s descent and this incredibly strong group looked nervously at one another to see who would sprint first. Sagan finished 4th as Julian Alaphilippe was the strongest in the final sprint.
“I was close but again not first…” Sagan said. “The race just happened like that after the Poggio, which we did in a headwind. I was on a good day, I thought I’d be worse.
“Deceuninck-Quick-Step did a good job on all the climbs and then Alaphilippe just was very strong. We kept him close and after I tried to do something with Kwiatkowski and Valverde, but they just controlled the situation.
“After, it was an unpredictable situation when we went down into San Remo. Trentin tried to attack in the last two kilometres and I just tried to close the gap. After another tried to attack and then Alaphilippe tried to attack, Mohoric attacked. Then we all came together.”
“I got a little stuck on the front for the sprint. It was a sprint from a low speed. When we opened the sprint, I was looking for Valverde and they passed me on the left and I was on the right. I was squeezed in and when I found space to sprint, it wasn’t enough. Alaphilippe had two bike lengths and it was hard to get him back.
