News: Tour of Utah

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Tao Geoghegan Hart (Axeon Hagens Berman) sprints to second on stage five of the Tour of Utah

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News: Tour of Utah

Team Press Release | By Sean Weide

Bountiful, Utah – Tao Geoghegan Hart scored the Axeon Hagens Berman Cycling Team’s third runner-up finish in five stages Friday at the Larry H. Miller Tour of Utah while teammate Adrien Costa conceded 27 seconds to his nearest competitors and slipped from second to third overall.

Kiel Reijnan (Trek-Segafredo) won the bunch sprint at the end of the 182.6-kilometer race from Antelope Island State Park to Bountiful.

Geoghegan Hart used a bike toss of his Specialized S-Works Tarmac to narrowly beat out three others for runner-up. Cannondale-Drapac Pro Cycling riders Alex Howes and Andrew Talansky were third and fourth, respectively, while Daniel Jaramillo (UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling) was fourth.

Geoghegan Hart’s result was his fourth runner-up finish of the year to go along with three victories. It also matched a second-place finish by teammate Colin Joyce on Stage 1 Monday and Costa’s runner-up result on Wednesday’s Stage 3.  … continued after advert

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Rather than talk about his own performance at the post-race press conference, Geoghegan Hart turned his attention to teammate Logan Owen, who won this same stage a year ago in a similar bunch sprint. This time, Owen was part of an 11-man breakaway that posed little threat to race leader Lachlan Morton. Despite that, Morton’s Jelly Belly presented by Maxxis teammates did not let the gap go out too much.

“Personally, I can’t say I always understand the tactics,” Geoghegan Hart said. “They have another two big days to ride and they have a rider who can win this race (Morton) and they are chasing down breakaways as if they are going to go and try to win the sprint”.

“I was a little bit frustrated today because we had someone up there and they didn’t need to keep it as close as they did. If it was our team (in the lead), we would have had some other teams contribute more. The closest guy in the breakaway was Logan and Julien Bernard (Trek-Segafredo), who were both at six minutes.”

As the breakaway was brought back on a hilly local circuit in Bountiful, it was Axeon Hagens Berman’s Irish national time trial champion, Eddie Dunbar, who was responding to attacks and countering with a move of his own. Geoghegan Hart, the British Under 23 national road champion and winner of Trofeo Piva and Stage 5 of the Tour de Savoie Mont Blanc, eventually joined his teammate and two others. The 21-year-old from Great Britain also put in an attack of his own before being brought back.

Eventually, 29 riders came to the line to contest the downhill sprint. A group of 11 – which included Costa and teammate Neilson Powless – arrived 27 seconds later. The lost time by Costa helped Talansky slot into second overall.

With two mountainous stages to go this weekend, the race’s “best young rider” is 34 seconds back of Morton and 25 seconds behind Talansky. Geoghegan Hart is Axeon Hagens Berman’s next-best placed rider in 10th, 4:01 back.

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