Time bonuses see Italian snatch back race lead from Michal Kwiatkowski
Moreno Moser (Liquigas-Cannondale) took his second stage of the 2012 Tour of Poland as he won the uphill sprint at the end of the sixth stage in Bukowina Tatrzanska. The 21-year-old Italian beat Colombian Sergio Henao (Team Sky) into second place, with Polish race leader Michal Kwiatkowski (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) in third, as they pulled clear of the rest of the race.
Time bonuses on the line saw stage one winner Moser take back the race lead from Kwiatkowski by a five second margin.
“I’d been targeting this stage since the race began because it was perfect for my abilities,” Moser explained. “I felt really good this morning and thought to myself that I didn’t want to miss my chance.
“The only time I was worried was after the last lap of the circuit, before the finish line, because cramp was setting in,” he continued. “The descent helped me to recover, and then I already knew what I wanted to do. Henao was ruining my plans but he was a useful point of reference. I also wanted to distance Kwiatkowski to have a decent lead in the general classification.
“I’ve got five seconds on him but that’s no peace of mind because although tomorrow’s stage is for sprinters, he’ll try to make that up with time bonuses. Tt’s going to be a very tough stage.”
The stage, which was made up of five laps of a hilly 38.4km circuit was dominated nby a five-man breakaway from Tom-Jelte Slagter (Rabobank), Roman Kreuziger (Astana), Ian Stannard (Team Sky), Bartosz Huzarski (Poland) and Tomasz Marczynski (Vacansoleil-DCM). By the halfway point the group was five minutes ahead, but they were eventually closed down and caught shortly before the end of the penultimate lap.
There was an immediate attack from Sergio Henao (Team Sky), who managed to briefly get clear, but the major effect of his move was to split the peloton behind him. There were late attacks from Przemyslaw Niemiec (Lampre-ISD) and Stannard, but the uphill sprint for the line saw the three-way battle between Moser, Henao and Kwiatkowski move clear.