Fjords: Lambrecht takes ‘tricky’ uphill finale, Albasini wins overall

In a race final that Amund Grøndahl (LottoNL-Jumbo) called “too idiotic” and last year’s race winner Edvald Boasson Hagen (Dimension Data) claimed was “too tricky,” newly crowned 2018 Tour des Fjords winner Michael Albasini (Mitchelton-Scott) was pleased with the finish — and result — on Wednesday despite taking second on the stage.

“It was good that the circuit was difficult,” Albasini told Eurosport. “It was lined out all the time and made it less stressful because it was less fighting for position, so in the end it worked out well.”

Albasini had pulled even on time with Stage 1 winner Fabio Jakobsen (Quick-Step Floors) after winning the penultimate stage 24 hours earlier in the three-day UCI 2.HC Europe Tour road race. According to the 37-year-old Swiss veteran, Australian Luke Durbridge’s big efforts on the front in the latter half of the stage coupled with remaining teammates’ support in the final circuit cannot be overlooked in the overall race victory.

“Durbridge was riding a very big race today pulling back the breakaway lead on his own, which was great, and then all the other guys took over for the last part of the final circuit, which was a really hard thing to do, and they did awesome,” praised Albasini, whose second-place finish behind Stage 3 winner and best young rider Bjorg Lambrecht (BEL) of Lotto Soudal was good enough to place himself atop the final general classification. “I was just sitting behind waiting to do my sprint up there, so I’m super happy for the team to finish off the work.”

Albasini’s teammate Carlos Verona (ESP) enjoyed the spoils of three hard day’s work by wrapping up the KOM jersey a day after he claimed it from Norwegian Henrik Evensen of Joker Icopal.

“Today was probably the hardest day of the three,” Verona told Eurosport. “We had to control from the start almost because Albasini was in a very good position. So, in the first KOM I couldn’t take points for the mountain, but then the rest was all for ‘Alba’ and we rode perfectly as a team.”

The fireworks came early as riders faced head-on the Ravneheia climb after only 23 kilometers. The short, steep 1.2-kilometre climb averaged 10 percent gradient and set the tone for the 183.8km queen stage finale, which featured three grueling categorised climbs, not to mention more than a dozen leg-smashing hills from Farsund to Egersund.

Four riders attacked initially, including Frenchman Julian Bernard (Trek-Segafredo), Belgian Maxime Monfort (Lotto Soudal), Spaniard Lluís Mas (Caja Rural-Seguros RGA) and Nathan Earle (Israel Cycling Academy), and the quartet quickly opened up a 37-second gap.

The foursome became six when Bulgarian Nikolay Mihaylov (Delko-Marseille Provence KTM) bridged to the break, followed closely by Julián Cardona (EF Education First-Drapac).

Only Earle and Monfort remained until the final 25km when Pascal Eenkhoorn [LottoNL-Jumbo] joined.

“It was pretty brutal out there,” Earle admitted to Eurosport. “The break took a long time to go. Had a few digs there, but got dropped on the first climb because I went too deep. I came back, got back on the front, went again and managed to force a selection off the front.

Earle admitted he was suffering as he reached the two-lap circuit, which sent riders up the final climb and across the finish line three times.

“I was secretly hoping to just get caught because it was hurting a lot,” the 29-year-old continued with a smile. “Then we got to the circuit which was exciting because if you are in a break all day you at least want to get to the circuit, cross the finish line and wave to the crowd, so that was nice.

“Then a LottoNL-Jumbo [rider] bridged across and I managed to stick with him, he tried to drop us. I dropped the guys on the last lap, then [Pieter Weening, Roompot-Nederlandse Loterij] came across and got on his wheel then got caught and that was day done. But it was really a good day out.”

For full stage and race results, click here.