Sagan Wins Tour Of California Second Stage

Last updated : 15 May 2012 By Covsupport News Service

Liquigas' Peter Sagan won the second stage of the Amgem Tour Of California.

It was foggy when the riders left San Francisco heading on a route some 117.1miles or 188kms to Santa Cruz County but the weather improved as the riders hit the hills of Bolder Creek.

Alexandre Geniez (Argos-Shimano) broke away from a five man break and was 4.30 clear with 70kms to go of a peloton which included Nicholas Roche who had crashed yesterday and been awarded the same time as the main group.

With 67.7kms to go, there was a touch of wheels and a number of riders went down including race leader Peter Sagan.

Geniez  took the four points for the climb at the Category One at Empire Grade with 64kms to go.

However, with 37kms left, Ireland's Phil Dagnell was one rider who had caught him and everyone was back together. Dagnell sprinted and took the points for being first up the Category 2 Bear Creek.

Like yesterday, Sagan, who was fined the equivilant of £20 for drafting behind a team car, punctured again but this time it was 28.8kms out and he had time to get himself back into the main field.

With 23kms to go, there was an intermediate sprint which Marc de Maar of the United Healthcare team took.

Everyone stayed together until there was a crash with 4.6kms and two BMC riders including George Hincapie went down.

The streets of Santa Cruz County were crowded as the finish headed towards the finish at the college.

Rory Sutherland on his home patch, went away with 2.5kms to go as Nibali did all the work to bring the peloton back.

He was caught with 800ms to go and the bunch sprint was on and Peter Sagan went on the final corner to win in a time of 5:02:00.

Haussler was again second with Lee Howerd third.

Sagan retains his gold leaders jersey with an eight second lead.

Stage 3 is from San Jose to Livermore and is 185.5kms long.