While one of many pre-race favourites Primož Roglič (Bora-Hansgrohe) moved into the lead of the Critérium du Dauphiné with victory on stage 6, ending simply 13 seconds behind him in fourth was the shock GC bundle – Derek Gee (Israel-Premier Tech).
The Canadian, who received stage 3 with a double late surge as much as Les Estables, broke by means of as a high breakaway rider eventually 12 months’s Giro d’Italia however the 2024 Dauphiné has seen him attain his profession peak at 26.
In 4 days of racing, he’s managed to win a stage and with it, transfer into the yellow jersey for a day, end fourth on the toughest stage but and keep fourth total heading into the ultimate two levels.
Today’s stage was by far essentially the most spectacular, nonetheless, with Gee even getting confused within the last few kilometres after being in unknown territory and preventing with the likes of Roglič and Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step) in a mountaintop end to the hors categorie Le Collet d’Allevard.
“By a longshot,” Gee admitted to ITV when requested if the stage went higher than anticipated. “I feel I perhaps even did an excessive amount of work within the climb simply because I’ve by no means been in that place.
“Usually, I’m simply hanging on for pricey life in order that was fairly cool.”
After Laurens De Plus (Ineos Grenadiers) and Aleksandr Vlasov (Bora-Hansgrohe) began the assaults within the last 5km of the climb, Gee was noticed bridging throughout to the chasing group which included Roglič and Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike) with Evenepoel dropped already.
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But he was doubtless on the entrance an excessive amount of and at instances dragging the remainder of the group in his wheel as much as the 2 leaders on the street. But he rallied within the last and was solely bested by the Bora duo and Jorgenson, beating a few of the high climbers in world biking within the course of.
“They began taking part in video games and normally I’m already passed by that time. There have been guys dropped and I used to be like ‘I do not need them to catch me’, so I simply began using,” stated Gee of his decision-making underneath excessive fatigue.
“Daryl [Impey, his DS] was in my ear going ‘Hey do not do an excessive amount of work’ and I used to be simply cross-eyed however I’m nonetheless fairly joyful.
“I regarded again in a number of hairpins and noticed the group was fairly small. Honestly, I wasn’t actually fascinated by making an attempt to go for the win at any level I used to be simply considering I do not know when the lights are going to exit however they’ll exit in some unspecified time in the future. Luckily, I made it to the road.”
Thanks to Gee’s gorgeous stage win and valiant defence of the yellow jersey within the stage 4 ITT, at this time’s climbing efficiency meant he held onto fourth total.
He’s sat properly inside attain of the rostrum, simply three seconds down on Jorgenson, or not less than a top-five GC lead to a WorldTour one-week stage race – one thing that may have been unthinkable earlier within the season after breaking his collarbone at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad.
“I feel now, after the primary take a look at, I can simply try to see how the subsequent couple of days go and hopefully get an excellent GC outcome,” Gee stated.
He has a 31-second benefit on Vlasov in fourth and two extra brutally robust summit finishes to take care of, however Gee appears to have discovered true flying kind after coming down from altitude and with the Tour de France approaching, his greatest outcomes look but to reach.