Australian sprinter Kaden Groves powered to his second win of the season in style, with an impressive turn of speed to finish off a textbook team performance on stage two of the Tour of Turkey.
After being boxed out on yesterday’s opening stage, Groves made no mistake today as he demonstrated his raw power and speed to squeeze through a gap and race away to victory in Alaçatı.
There were some nervous moments on the 156.4km stage when the peloton split following a section of crosswinds with 25km remaining. Groves looked to be caught the wrong side of the split, but the Volta a Catalunya stage winner was soon able to make it back to the head of the race as the bunch came back together.
Team BikeExchange-Jayco then assumed control of the charging peloton as they raced into the finale, with Groves in tow at the back of the lead out train. As the sprint opened up the 23-year-old burst out of the pack before diving through a gap and powering away to his second victory of 2022.
The win puts Groves into the race lead and into the points jersey ahead of stage three, with another sprint stage in store tomorrow.
Kaden Groves (1st):
“It’s pretty amazing! I’m very happy to back up with another win already this season and I can’t thank my team enough today, they did such a great job.
It wasn’t too bad [the wind] because it was a tailwind coming in from 10km to go, so it was just super-fast. But we waited and waited until the exit off the big open road with about 4km to go. We nailed the plan today, everyone knew their role and where they had to take us, it was pretty textbook in the end.
We weren’t really sure in the direction of the wind, it was changing quite a bit today, but we thought why not try and take another team with us, in the end the wind wasn’t in the right direction. It was certainly strong enough, everyone tried, but nothing really, really happened.”
Gene Bates (Sport Director):
“What a win! It was a super effort by the whole team today, we really targeted these flatter stages with Kaden, it was a big reason for coming to Turkey and it’s a very satisfying result to take a win here after the third place yesterday.
We got a little bit lost with probably about 9km to go, but they regrouped really well inside the last 3km when they took the front. We knew it was going to be a tailwind finish, so we wanted to be right in front before the sprint started and the last guys did a great job of placing Kaden where he wanted to be.
When you’re as fast as Kaden you just need some clear air, and he showed us how good he is today.”
2022 Tour of Turkey Stage 2 – Results:
1. Kaden Groves 4:02:11
2. Jasper Philipsen ST
3. Sam Bennett ST
2022 Tour of Turkey Stage 2 – GC:
1. Kaden Groves 8:40:12
2. Jasper Philipsen +0:02
3. Caleb Ewan +0:04
Photo: Getty Sport
