The Soudal-Quickstep youth team had a perfect day on the roads of stage 4 of the Tour du Rwanda today between Karongi and Rubavu on the shores of Lake Kivu. William Lecerf won the sprint and team-mate Pepijn Reinderink retained the leader’s yellow jersey. The stage was short, but it included a 3,000 metre climb that could have worried the peloton.
Chris Froome tried his luck at the very start of the stage, but it didn’t work out in his favour as he was quickly caught by the peloton.
Frenchman Pierre Latour then attacked, the rider from the TotalEnergies team breaking away after 20 kilometres and staying at the front of the race for almost 40 kilometres with a lead that never exceeded 2 minutes.
With 30 kilometres to go, it was another Frenchman who attacked, Brieuc Rolland, the young rider from Groupama-FDJ. He remained alone at the front until 2 kilometres from the finish before the first part of the peloton came back on him to launch the sprint.
Soudal-Quickstep were the strongest to prepare for the victory of young William Lecerf ahead of Colombian Jhonatan Restrepo of the Polti-Kometa team, winner of stage 3 yesterday, and Frenchman Julien Simon of TotalEnergies.
Dutchman Pepijn Reinderink of Soudal-Quickstep will wear the yellow jersey again tomorrow in the 13-kilometre uphill time trial stage 5 between Musanze and Kinigi.
Panorama
