Wilco Kelderman fought all day in an escape today and rewarded himself with third place in the final stage of the Tour de Romandie. Team LottoNL-Jumbo’s leader just stayed in front of the peloton, but could not stop Michael Albasini (Orica - GreenEDGE) and Andrey Amador (Movistar). Moreno Hofland sprinted to fifth.

“We’re ending this Tour de Romandie with a little bit of a better feeling after this stage,” Sports Director Frans Maassen said. “We knew that it was a 50 per cent chance today that the breakaway was going to make it and Wilco Kelderman acted on that very well. You must be a little lucky, but he was in the right place at the right time.”

Frustrating

Wilco Kelderman was thinking about this breakaway already when he eased off in Saturday’s stage. “But it’s never easy to be in the first group,” he added. “I was in the right break, but I didn’t feel that strong. I wasn’t confident about my chances to make it into the stage’s final, but I almost won eventually. It’s a pity that I wasn’t able to take my chance in the end, but I wasn’t fast enough in the final sprint.

"I’m finishing this stage race with a positive feeling anyway. This wasn’t what I came for obviously, but it went wrong already in the prologue. I wasn’t good enough in the end and that’s frustrating. My body had to recover from that crash and that took a lot of energy.”

Good things

Behind Kelderman, Moreno Hofland delivered a strong final sprint. “Our riders worked hard for Moreno and he delivered a good sprint,” Maassen added. “Besides that, Wilco showed character. It wasn’t for him yesterday, but he reacted on that today.

"I’ve seen some good things this week. Steven Lammertink improved and the riders who’re heading towards the Giro d’Italia were able to have a good preparation. Your front man decides what the verdict is in the end and we have to conclude that we wanted more that this final result.”