Kristoff beats Sagan on photo finish in Tour of California
Stage 7 returned to Santa Rosa, an area that has hosted many stages of the Amgen Tour of California. The 175,5 km stage featured 6 rated climbs including the category 1 King Ridge Road.
From a break Peter Sagan (Tinkoff) went solo and held 2 minutes to the peloton, with the yellow jersey Julian Alaphilippe (Etixx – Quick-Step) in the group. Sagan tried to hold his advantage, but once the majority of the climbs were behind and the groups were coming back to him, he sat up to try his luck in the circuits, but Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) had other plans and used his team to perfection to earn the victory.
With 200 m to go he came off the wheel of teammate Michael Mørkøv and gunned for the line, taking the victory just ahead of Peter Sagan, marking his first win in the Amgen Tour of California in two appearances. The win was the 8th win for Kristoff in the 2016 cycling season and marks the first win in the USA for Team Katusha.
Julian Alaphilippe held on to the race lead, still ahead of BMC teammates Rohan Dennis by 16-seconds and 38-seconds to Brent Bookwalter. Team KATUSHA’s Jurgen Van den Broeck currently holds tenth place at +1.48 on the general classification.
Giro d’Italia 2016 – stage 7 results (Santa Rosa – Santa Rosa):
| 1 | Alexander Kristoff (Katusha) |
4:19:52 |
| 2 | Peter Sagan (Tinkoff) |
,, |
| 3 | Danny Van Poppel (Sky) |
,, |
| 4 | Mike Teunissen (LottoNl-Jumbo) |
,, |
| 5 | Bryan Coquard (Direct Energie) |
,, |
| 6 | Jasper Stuyven (Trek-Segafredo) |
,, |
| 7 | Travis McCabe (Holowesko-Citadel) |
,, |
| 8 | John Degenkolb (Giant-Alpecin) |
,, |
| 9 | Timo Roosen (LottoNl-Jumbo) |
,, |
| 10 | Ruben Guerreiro (Axeon Hagens Berman) |
,, |
General classification after stage 7:
| 1 | Julian Alaphilippe (Etixx – Quick-Step) |
28:46:38 |
| 2 | Rohan Dennis (BMC) |
+16” |
| 3 | Brent Bookwalter (BMC) |
+38” |
| 4 | Andrew Talansky (Cannondale) |
+47” |
| 5 | Neilson Powless (Axeon Hagens Berman) |
+01’08” |
| 6 | Lawson Craddock (Cannondale) |
+01’17” |
| 7 | Samuel Sanchez (BMC) |
,, |
| 8 | Laurens ten Dam (Giant-Alpecin) |
+01’24” |
| 9 | George Bennett (LottoNl-Jumbo) |
+01’45” |
| 10 | Jurgen Van den Broeck (Katusha) |
+01’48” |
