Tour of Poland: Another win for Ben Swift

Team Sky’s Ben Swift claimed his second stage win at the Tour of Poland after sprinting to a superb victory in Zakopane.

The Rotherham rider came from several metres back in the final kilometre to beat Elia Viviani (Liquigas-Cannondale) and Pim Ligthart (Vaconsoleil-DCM) to the line on stage five.

The show of strength extended Swift’s lead in the points classification, while Michal Kwiatkowski (Omega Pharma-QuickStep) hung onto top spot in the overall standings by one second ahead of Moreno Moser (Liquigas-Cannondale). Swift’s team-mate, British Road Race Champion Ian Stannard, who won in Poland in 2011, had a go in the closing stages joining a four-man breakaway.

Stannard did well to bridge across on a descent along with Jaroslaw Marycz (Saxo Bank-Tinkoff Bank), but when the road started to kick up towards the finish Bakelants went away solo. The Belgian was reeled in with just over 3km to go as the sprint trains formed forming on the high-speed run to the line.

In the tough last kilometre, Michael Matthews (Rabobank) and Viviani got a gap and for a moment, looked like they would fight it out amongst themselves for the stage win but Swift bridged across the gap with several other riders on his wheel and still had enough left in the legs to come around the leading duo and take the win.

Ben Swift “I’m really happy with the result. It was quite a long sprint and I had to go really early as I saw that (Michael) Matthews and (Elia) Viviani had a good gap.

“Stages like that are always strange as it depends how the peloton race it. The climbs weren’t too difficult but it could have been a different story if the GC guys had really hit out. I felt really good and I could ride at the front up the climbs, as well as having some great protection from the guys. Once I knew I was climbing well and saw that I could respond to a few attacks it gave me a lot of confidence for the sprint.

“I knew that the form was good coming into the race but I’ve had a little bit of bad luck along the way. I had the puncture on the first stage and then I got the win which was really nice. Yesterday I was quite disappointed as the guys did such a fantastic job. To get beat on the line was disappointing, not only for myself but for the guys after they’d done such a good job. Today it was nice to get another win and pay them back.”

Boonen Out

Quickstep’s Tom Boonen was forced to pull out of the race because of pain to the right side of his chest, as consequence of Tuesday’s crash. Boonen will fly back to Belgium tomorrow and he will pass more specific medical checks tomorrow, and on Monday.

“The entire day was OK, a little bit painful but OK,” Boonen said. “I worked for the team without particular problems. Then in the final, at about 30 km from the finish, I did a wrong movement to avoid a pothole in the road, and suddenly I got really bad pain on the right side of my chest. I couldn’t breathe.”

“That’s why I decided to stop. It’s a pity — my condition is good and here the team is fantastic, there is a great atmosphere. It’s hard to leave the team here, but I have to do what is best for my health leading up to the Olympics.”