Sepp Kuss (Team Jumbo-Visma) won stage 15 of the Tour de France, being the strongest out of large breakaway to go solo to the line in Andorra la Vella.
Stage 15 of the Tour de France was another difficult climbing day as the peloton had to cover 191km, including 4 categorised climbs. A fast start on a small climb saw a big breakaway group go clear in the opening kilometers.
Sergio Henao was one of the first 8 riders to go clear before another 24 riders came across to the front group. Groupama-FDJ had numbers in the front group and so they took control of the pace and pushed the lead out to over 9’00”, ahead of the yellow jersey group.
The first real shake up in the race happened on the climb of Port d’Envalira, when the attacks started in the break but also back in the peloton, Ineos and Movistar upped the pace.
Henao came into difficulty on near the top of exposed climb as the strong winds also contributed to the group splitting. A select group made it over the top and descended to the base of the final climb, where Kuss then attacked early on and distanced his counterparts.
The American would not be seen again, and took a very good victory. Henao managed to hold of the chase from the yellow jersey group to finish 18th on the stage and retained his 18th position on the overall classification too.
Sergio Henao
I fought really hard to get into the break today, as we'd planned, and we managed to get a small group together at the start which was perfect. We then had the bigger group come across to us and I rode very comfortably.
There was a very special moment for me with my family waiting for me on the final climb, and I gave it my all so I'm proud of my fighting performance.
We'll take stock again on the rest day, recover well and then look ahead to an exciting final week heading towards Paris. There's still a lot of racing to be done in this race.
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Team Qhubeka NextHash.
Media Contact:
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Email: jean@ryder.co.za
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About Team Qhubeka NextHash:
Team Qhubeka NextHash is a purpose-led, high-performance team, fighting to win on the world's biggest stage, to inspire hope and create opportunity. Founded in 2007, Team Qhubeka NextHash (formerly NTT Pro Cycling) became the first-ever African cycling team to gain a UCI WorldTour license, in 2016.
We achieved our first major win in 2013 when Gerald Ciolek won Milan-San Remo, one of the five Monuments of cycling. We have competed in six Tour de France’s and notched up 7 stage wins, with Mark Cavendish wearing the coveted Yellow Jersey at the 2016 Tour de France.
We are a multicultural, diverse team with bases in South Africa, the Netherlands and Italy. There are 19 nationalities represented across our World Tour and continental feeder team rosters. Our focus on developing African cycling has resulted in more than 55 riders from the African continent be given the opportunity to race on the world stage, since the team's inception.
We race to help people to move forward with bicycles through our relationship with Qhubeka Charity. Through our work with Qhubeka, we have contributed to the distribution of over 30 000 bicycles in communities in South Africa.
About Qhubeka:
Qhubeka is a charity that moves people forward with bicycles. People earn bicycles through our programmes, improving their access to schools, clinics and jobs.
A bicycle is a tool that helps people to travel faster and further, and to carry more. In the face of extreme and persistent poverty, bicycles can change lives by helping to address socioeconomic challenges at the most basic level – helping people to get where they need to go.
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Source: Apo-Opa
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