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A16 SPORTS
Thursday 13 July 2023
Philipsen secures 4th sprint win at Tour de France
MOULINS, France (AP) — remained in third place, 2
Jasper Philipsen is in a class minutes, 40 seconds off the
of his own when it comes pace.
to sprinting at the Tour de Philipsen, who rides for
France. He is so strong that Alpecin–Deceuninck, had
even when the teammate been perfectly guided by
in charge of setting him up his leadout man Mathieu
is not there, he still wins in van der Poel in his three
the end. previous stage wins. Left on
The Belgian sprinter posted his own this time, he per-
his fourth stage win at this fectly timed his move and
year’s Tour de France on once again proved stron-
Wednesday, taking his ca- gest in the frenetic last kilo-
reer tally to six. meter of the 180-kilometer
“It’s been an incredible (112 miles) Stage 11 from
Tour so far,” Philipsen said Clermont-Ferrand to Mou-
after outclassing the field. lins in central France.
“I can’t realize how good Philipsen has lost just one
it is all going, so I’m super Belgium’s Jasper Philipsen celebrates his fourth stage victory as he crosses the finish line ahead of the five mass sprints that
proud and really happy of Netherlands’ Dylan Groenewegen, just behind Philipsen, and Germany’s Phil Bauhaus, left, as took place at this year’s
with my shape. he crosses the finish line to win the eleventh stage of the Tour de France cycling race over 180 Tour when Mad Pedersen
And also, to get through kilometers (112 miles) with start in Clermont-Ferrand and finish in Moulins, France, Wednesday, won Stage 8.
the final without problems July 12, 2023. Associated Press With van der Poel not tak-
is also a big challenge, and ing part in Wednesday’s
we managed to do it four There were no major chang- tion: Jonas Vingegaard over two-time champion sprint, Philipsen navigated
times, so I’m super happy.” es in the general classifica- kept his 17-second lead Tadej Pogacar. Jai Hindley his way through traffic at
an average speed of 65.6
kmh (40.8 mph) in the last
kilometer to join Mark Cav-
endish as the only active
rider with at least four stage
wins in a single Tour edition.
Cavendish crashed out of
the race last week.After Al-
exander Kristoff launched
the sprint, Dylan Groe-
newegen countered with
Philipsen on his wheel.
The Belgian’s power was
too much to handle for
Groenewegen, who had
to be content with a run-
ner-up finish. Phil Bauhaus
completed the stage po-
dium.
“I had to find my wheel a
little bit, and it’s also finding
the space, and it’s hectic
and dangerous for crash-
ing, but I’m happy I could
find a good wheel Groe-
newegen in the end, he
opened up early, and I
could go over,” Philipsen
summed up.
Following a day of furious
racing in hot weather that
took a toll on the peloton,
Andrey Amador moved to
the front immediately after
the start of the stage but
quickly noticed there were
not a lot of riders interested
in jumping into a break.
Amador for a while rode
only a few meters ahead
of the bunch before Matis
Louvel and Daniel Oss
joined his effort as they
broke away without facing
resistance from the pelo-
ton. q
