Stage 4 – Catania > Villafranca Tirrena (140km)

Profile

Preview

Despite the third-category climb in the middle of today’s profile, this shortish stage ought to end in a sprint. Which fast men will compete for it will depend on how hard they ride up the Portella Mandrazzi, which is a long one at nearly 20km but averages only around 4% (or 12km at 5% depending on how you measure it). 

Teams that may want to ride it hard include Bora for Peter Sagan and Sunweb for Michael Matthews, who will be trying to drop Arnaud Démare and Fernando Gaviria, or at least deaden their legs a little. We saw at the Tour how willing Bora were to drive the pace on the front to distance sprint rivals, and they may fancy it again today. One little fly in that ointment is that Bora and Sunweb now have genuine GC hopes in Rafał Majka and Wilco Kelderman so may prefer to stay defensive and protect them.

There’s a long descent and a flat 40km to get back on if distanced, so all is not lost should Démare or Gavira get gapped on the climb. The final is a little technical with quite a few bends, and a crucial one inside the flamme rouge where good positioning will be key to a good result.

Contenders

If this is a straight out sprint and the climb isn’t too tough then I think Arnaud Démare has to be favourite – he’s around the 5/2 mark. He’s been on stellar form post-lockdown and if he’s held onto it will be difficult to beat. That said, he was dropped pretty quickly on stage 2 when the road went up and may struggle again today on the third-category which would level the playing field coming to the line.

Peter Sagan at around 7/2 looked good but couldn’t quite finish off the job two days ago – it looked like he was about to start his sprint before he realized there wasn’t room on the inside, paused momentarily to switch, and at that moment Ulissi was away and gone. He’s clearly going well and if this turns tough then he’s clearly one of the favourites. 

Fernando Gaviria is going well and together with Démare is the fastest on the startlist. He could very possibly take this home at around 11/4. Michael Matthews may be smarting after stage 2 where he was the big favourite but got gapped on the final climb, he’ll be up for some revenge today and I fancy him. 

We know the quality of Elia Viviana but maybe a watching brief is better for today to see if he’s rediscovered his best form – it would be a shot in the dark to back him for this. Others that could make the places but are unlikely to win are Davide Ballerini, Álvaro Hodeg, Rudy Barbier and Davide Cimolai. 

It will be interesting to see how a sprint between these guys turns out, and we can judge the sprinter hierarchy. I think Démare is the most likely, but I’m worried at how quick he went backwards on stage 2 and the price is based on his form of the last few months – has he gone over his training peak? At the prices, I prefer Michael Matthews – hopefully the climb is tough and it’s a straight fight between Bling and Sagan to the line.

I’ve backed him once already, but I’m also going to throw in Ben Swift. He was impressive up Etna, having initially gone back to help Thomas, he then managed to get back to the pointy end of the peloton to work for Geoghegan Hart and Castroviejo. Ineos will be refocusing their goals after yesterday’s disaster and will want to bounce back as quickly as possible.

Michael Matthews 2pts ew (1/5 1 2 3 4) @11/2 

Ben Swift 0.5pts ew (1/5 1 2 3 4) @25/1

Stage 4 Result

1st Arnaud Démare; 2nd Peter Sagan; 3rd Davide Ballerini; 4th Andrea Vendrame

Recommended:

Michael Matthews 2pts ew (1/5 1 2 3 4) @11/2 – lost (-4pts)

Ben Swift 0.5pts ew (1/5 1 2 3 4) @25/1 – lost (-1pt)

Chapeau or no (chapeau)?

No chapeau. The stage went as called with Bora pushing the pace on the climb, and they managed to distance Viviana, Gaviria and Hodeg but crucially not Arnaud Démare. Viviani got back on but FDJ and Bora both worked hard for the final flat 30km to prevent Gaviria from making his way back. The sprint was a little messy and ended in a three-way photo which Démare edged. Matthews looked in decent position on Sagan’s wheel but lost it in the final 200m and wasn’t able to recover, though not sure he had the pace to challenge anway. Swift crashed early in the stage which did for his chances, no luck for Ineos.

Total Stakes: 22.5pts; Profit/Loss: -9.2pts (-40.1%)