Stage 4
Willunga - Willunga, 147.4 km
The 4-km 10 % climb with 20 km to go is likely to shatter the field to bits; this will be Malone's chance to wrest the orange jersey from Ljungblad. After an early downhill, there's three laps in a 30-km circuit before attacking the final hill.
The expected breakaway came on 14km, but was judged slightly too dangerous by Casson Dairy, who set an early pace. However, after the breakaway was caught Savings & Loans somehow flowed away from the group.
Julian Dean joined the 12-man effort, along with Longo Borghini and other assorted riders.
It was doomed. Attacking to get rid of the Savings & Loans team worked rarely, though
Dean and Pearson eventually got a lead with 25km to go; shortly afterwards the climb began and
Forner raced in at a massive pace to catch up, with Casson Dairy having dominated the catch to the breakaway.
Dean took the lead in the main bunch when he was caught, but this led to a lower pace, and Jelle Vanendert began attacking with 3km to the top.
This was a good time to challenge Ljungblad, who was still stuck somewhere in the middle of the 70-man peloton.
Malone raced onto Vanendert's wheel, and caught up after 400 metres before continuing to push.
Motivated by fan writing, Malone left Vanendert with ease
Malone raced away easily, and though there were other attackers from the main bunch, such as Rujano of Unibet, Brandt (Predictor-Lotto) and Gerrans of AG2R,
Malone held on easily and had over a minute when he passed the top. Ljungblad desperately tried to defend the jersey, attacking over the climb, but still trailed by more than two minutes over the climb, some twenty seconds ahead of a Crédit Agricole-led peloton along with
Dwyer and
Forner.
The final 20 km were a time to collect groups; Gerrans caught up with Rujano and Vanendert, and the three chased
Malone well while cooperating, while Ljungblad and Brandt lost time to a fast-riding peloton. However, as seen above,
Malone had a significant gap back entering the final sloping two kilometres. Though Gerrans rode hard and sprinted away from his second group, Malone was unbeatable, and could celebrate the stage win and the orange leaders' jersey.
Results:
1 Bugs Malone TEAM CASSON DAIRY 3h36'22
2 Simon Gerrans AG2R PRÉVOYANCE + 50
3 José Rujano UNIBET.COM s.t.
4 Jelle Vanendert CHOCOLADE JACQUES - TOPSPORT VLAANDEREN s.t.
5 Jonas Ljungblad UNIBET.COM + 2'00
6 Christophe Brandt PREDICTOR - LOTTO s.t.
7 Robert McLachlan DRAPAC PORSCHE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM s.t.
8 Mitch Docker DRAPAC PORSCHE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM s.t.
9 Sébastien Hinault CRÉDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
10 Josh Forner TEAM CASSON DAIRY s.t.
11 Julian Dean TEAM CASSON DAIRY s.t.
28 Chris Dwyer TEAM CASSON DAIRY s.t.
53 riders in same time
101 David Kearsley TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 8'30
109 Zac Gelman TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 9'03
116 Manjunath Reddlapalli TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 9'43
118 Ryan Dunn TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 11'53
General classification:
1 Bugs Malone TEAM CASSON DAIRY 14h25'49
2 Jonas Ljungblad UNIBET.COM + 2'08
3 Simon Gerrans AG2R PRÉVOYANCE + 2'13
4 José Rujano UNIBET.COM + 2'17
5 Jelle Vanendert CHOCOLADE JACQUES - TOPSPORT VLAANDEREN + 2'25
6 Mitch Docker DRAPAC PORSCHE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM + 2'47
7 Alessandro Petacchi TEAM MILRAM + 3'15
8 Benny De Schrooder CHOCOLADE JACQUES - TOPSPORT VLAANDEREN + 3'25
9 Sébastien Hinault CRÉDIT AGRICOLE + 3'27
10 Glenn Chadwick NAVIGATORS INSURANCE CYCLING TEAM s.t.
12 Josh Forner TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 3'35
28 Chris Dwyer TEAM CASSON DAIRY s.t.
59 Julian Dean TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 7'54
79 David Kearsley TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 14'34
80 Manjunath Reddlapalli TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 14'40
89 Zac Gelman TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 15'07
109 Ryan Dunn TEAM CASSON DAIRY + 29'06
Points classification:
1 Mitch Docker DRAPAC PORSCHE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM 74
2 Bugs Malone TEAM CASSON DAIRY 47
3 Jonas Ljungblad UNIBET.COM 43
9 Josh Forner TEAM CASSON DAIRY 20
11 Ryan Dunn TEAM CASSON DAIRY 20
13 Julian Dean TEAM CASSON DAIRY 17
27 David Kearsley TEAM CASSON DAIRY 9
Mountain classification:
1 Jonas Ljungblad UNIBET.COM 28
2 Simon Pearson SAVINGS & LOANS CYCLING TEAM 26
3 Paolo Longo Borghini BARLOWORLD 24
4 Bugs Malone TEAM CASSON DAIRY 18
7 Manjunath Reddlapalli TEAM CASSON DAIRY 14
Btw, can anyone make a 69 x 46 sized logo for us to wear on the jerseys? Gets a bit confusing having unibet on our jerseys.
![Tongue :p :p](/forum/images/smilies/original/tongue.gif)