A fascinating week of racing at the Tour of the Basque Country came to a controversial end on Sunday, after Astana`s Jakob Fuglsang found himself first racing to a podium spot and even standing on the final podium, before being retroactively demoted due to a decision by the race organisers. Over a minute after the Dane had finished, and unbeknownst to him, race leader Emanuel Buchmann (Bora-Hansgrohe) had taken a wrong turn in the closing metres of stage 6, losing vital seconds as he sought to hang on to third overall. One of the six men from the chase group to suffer the impromptu detour - due to either rider or marshal error - Buchmann was later given the same time as those riders who stayed on course. That meant that he gained 12 seconds on Fuglsang, who ultimately finished five seconds down in fourth.ADVERTISEMENT Fuglsang, who had stood on the final podium after the race, took to Instagram to voice his displeasure at the decision, saying, `First on the podium as third overall after a day where I left it all out on the road for Ion [Izagirre] to take the victory, and to get on the final podium. `Afterwards, they then stripped me of the podium because Buchmann followed the deviation of the cars and motorbikes [at] 300 metres to go. Afterwards, he was given the same time as the other guys in his group that went the right way. `[I`ve] never heard of something like that before and I´m speechless about the decision. I mean, he didn`t have a technical problem or crash - HE went wrong. [I] find it ridiculous.`
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
|
