Tour de Romandie: Lenny Martinez pips João Almeida in sprint atop Thyon 2000 to secure stage 4 victory and overall lead
Lorenzo Fortunato takes third on mo♊untaintop finish, moꩵves up to second place overall ahead of finale time trial on Sunday

168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious) took victory on the Queen stage 4 of the 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Tour de Romandie, outsprinting 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:João Almeida (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) atop the 20km climb to Thyon🅠 2000 to also take the race le🦂ad.
The pair had attacked an already select group to go away in the final 4k💖m, and were closely🉐 matched on the final slopes, with only half a wheel in the final sprint.
Stage 2 winner Lorenzo Fortunato (XDS Astana) took thi🅘rd on the day, just ahead of Almeida's teammate Jay Vine, with the Italian movi🦹ng into second overall.
The key action all unfolded in the finaღl 8km of the 20km climb, with Bahrain Victorious and UAE Team Emirates-XRG setting a high pace before Vine and Almeida attacked to draw out a select group with Martinez and Fortunato.
Four became two when Martinez and Almeida pushed on and battled for the victory. Martinez now leads the GC with only on🍨e stage remaining, though Alme💜ida is very much still in contention, three seconds back ahead of Sunday's final time trial.
"It was a super long climb, so here you just have to try to n🍸ot go too deep for too long, otherwise you can get tired very quickly," Martinez said at the finish.
"It was really hard, but we rode really well as a pair, and in the end I had the punch to beat João Alm💜eida, butℱ he was really strong too, so I'm really happy to win here today for the team.
"I didn't want to g♒o ahead alone,🐎 and I think they [UAE] were trying to distance the Astana rider for the GC, so that benefited me a bit. They set a good pace, so he was distanced, and then I went with João, and we rode super strong."
Leader at the start of the day, Alex Baudin (EF Education-EasyPost) said goodbye to the yellow jersey after dr𒁏opping early on the climb and the GC was completely shake🙈n up by the top of the climb, with the top three riders now within three seconds of each other but bigger gaps after that.
The losers of the day included the still-recovering 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Remco Evenepoel, who opted to work for his teammate and best young rider Junior Lecerf instead of his own interests on the Queen stage, and thou💙gh Lecerf dropped three places on GC, assistance from Evenepoel does mean he keeps the white jersey.
Even after over 4,000m of climbing on stage 4, the race is not over yet, and will be decided by stage 5's 17km timꦿe trial around Geneva.
How it unfolded
Stage 4 of the Tour de Romandie featured five categorised climbs, but the first four were really just a warm-up for the final 20.2km ascent up to Thyon 2000, set to be the most decisiveꦯ finish of the෴ race so far.
On the first climb, a 14.5km steady ascent up to Anzère, a three-man group got away with relative ease, made up of Louis Barré (Intermarché-Wanty), Julien Bernard (Lidl-Trek) and mountains classification leader Ben Zwiehoff (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe), in pursuit of more mountain po🉐ints before the final climb.
They were allowed to build up a gap, but nothing too substantial, as 💞UAE Team Emirates-XRG did much of the work to control things and keep the leaders within reach. The situation remained calm and controlled for most of the first 80km of the stage, with Zwiehoff accomplishing his aim of winning the KoM points, enough to ens😼ure he will take home the jersey as long as he finishes the race on Sunday.
On the descent after the penultimate climb to Suen, Zwiehoff duly sat up to ܫwait for the peloton, allowing Barré and Bernard to push on but with their gap shrinking as the race approached th🙈e base of Thyon 2000.
The pair started the climb still 45 seconds ahead of the peloton, though Barré was soon dropped, leaving Bernard to push on ahead of the pe🌌loton led by Lotto and Bahraiಌn Victorious.
Heading into the last 15km, race leader Alex Baudin was oneꦐ of the first riders to ไbe dropped, and with very few riders to support him and try to limit his losses, his time in the yellow jersey was over.
With just under 14km to go, Bernard was swept up by the peloton, but what remained of the bunch – aro🌱und 35 rider🧸s – stayed controlled as Lotto continued to lead the way, working for Lennert Van Eetvelt.
Heading into the final 8km, an injection of pace from Bahrain Victorious saw the group start to shrink more quickly, with various riders suffe🐎ring, including the Soudal-QuickStep duo of Evenepoel and white jersey wearer Junior Lecerf as the Belgian tried to he꧒lp his younger teammate.
Hearing Evenepoel was off the b꧒ack, Almeida and Jay Vine started to pace for UAE Team Emirates, dragging out a very select group alongside Lorenzo Fortunato (XDS Astana) ♏and Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious).
It was Vine who set the pace up the climb, before Almeida pushed on with 4km 🍌to go, taking Martinez with him, and the pair were playing a tactic🎶al game, testing each other without fully attacking.
Behind, Carlos Rodríguez🐼 (Ineos Grenadiers) rejoined Vine and Fortunato, but even as a trio, the chasers weren't making inroads into the leaders, with Vine not working, and the pair stayed ahead to fight for the win between them.
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Matilda is an NCTJ-qualified journalist based in the UK who joined Cyclingnews in March 2025. Prior to that, she worked as the Racing News Editor at GCN, and extensively as a freelancer contributing to Cyclingnews, Cycling Weekly, Velo, Rouleur, Escape Collective, Red Bull and more. She has reported from many of the biggest events on the calendar, including the Giro d'Ita🧔lia, Tour de France Femmes, Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. She has particular experience and expertise in women's cycling, and women's sport in general. She is a graduate of modern languages and sports journalism.
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