The largest multi-day road cycling race in the Baltic States, the Tour of Lithuania, continues. On Friday, the third day of the competition, Eimantas Gudiškis was close to the first Lithuanian prize-winning place – the most capable Lithuanian mountain biker fought tenaciously at the finish line, ending up seventh.
The third stage took place near the city of Utena, where cyclists had to overcome 177.57 km. The race began with an unexpected fall, but after a few moments all the athletes returned to their bikes – the start was given a second time. The Norwegian Elias Gran Hermansen (Team Ringerike) took the initiative at the beginning of the competition, breaking away from the peloton alone. Later, 6 more athletes caught up with the race leader, and the resulting group of 7 athletes led until the 103rd kilometer.
In the second part of the race, five athletes made a successful escape, including Rokas Kmieliauskas from the Energus Cycling Team. However, with less than 5 kilometers left, the peloton regrouped and a group of fifty cyclists reached the finish line almost simultaneously.
“Today started off quite intensely, I kept trying to escape, but I couldn’t. After that, I realized that we weren’t going anywhere and towards the end of the race we saw that we would probably catch up with the cyclists who had escaped. Rokas Adomaitis dedicated himself to getting me to the finish line and everything went really well, we avoided crashes, but at the end we got stuck and we couldn’t get out to fight for the podium. I finished seventh, which is a good result, but when you know how close everything was, it’s a bit sad,” commented Eimantas Gudiškis, the national team member who performed best among the Lithuanians.
Karlas Kuritsas, representing the Estonian national team, won the race, beating the medalists: the Pole Radoslaw Fratczak (“Wibatech Lubelskie Perla Polski”) and the Latvian Martinas Ploto (“Energus Cycling Team”).
“My day, I can say it was easy. My job was just to protect myself and keep as much energy as possible for the finish sprint. We managed to close the gap in the last 200-300 meters. Last year I was second here, so I knew the finish quite well. Today my recipe was a familiar finish section and the help of my teammates,” said K. Kuritsas.
The overall leader remains the Italian Alexander Konychev (China Anta – Mentech Cycling Team), who also leads the points standings with 35 points. The leader in the most active cyclist category is the Estonian Raitas Armas (Energus Cycling Team) and will start Saturday’s race with the green jersey.
In the U23 standings, the winner of the second stage, the Estonian Lauri Tammas (Estonian national team), remains the leader, ahead of the Lithuanian national team member Rokas Adomaitis. Ours remains sixth in the overall standings.
The Tour of Lithuania is the largest road cycling race in the Baltic States, classified as a UCI 2.2 category event: cyclists can earn ranking points that allow them to compete for World and European Championships and even the Olympic Games. The Tour of Lithuania, taking place for the fourth year in a row, consists of five stages: on Saturday, cyclists will start and finish in Kaunas.
The Tour of Lithuania cycling race is partially financed by state funds administered by the National Sports Agency, as well as by the municipalities of Tauragė, Kėdainiai, Utena, Kaunas and Vilnius.
