Arvid de Kleijn made it two top-10 finishes in a row at the Tour of Denmark today, sprinting to seventh place in Sønderborg. Former world champion Mad Pedersen (Trek – Segafredo) beat a tussling Giacomo Nizzolo (Team Qhubeka NextHash) and Dylan Groenwegen (Team Jumbo-Visma) to the line in his home race.
Deceuninck – Quick Step and Team Jumbo-Visma ramped up the speed during the final circuit to keep the pace high for their sprinters while Colin Joyce surfed the wheels to put de Kleijn in a great position for the run to the line. The Dutchman lost Joyce’s wheel momentarily but used the other rider’s slipstreams to good effect and propelled himself to seventh place.
🇩🇰 Impressive sprint finish by @arviddekleijn to take seventh on stage 2 of #PNDKR21 🔥
Arvid now sits sixth overall. pic.twitter.com/87GkzypBv3
— Rally Cycling (@Rally_Cycling) August 11, 2021
Joyce finished well himself, crossing the line in 13th and outsprinting Mark Cavendish (Deceuninck – Quick Step) in the process.
The Tour of Denmark is well known for plenty of crosswind action due to Summer North Sea winds and exposed roads. A split occurred as the peloton chased the early breakaway and Rally Cycling missed out. After a hard chase, they brought things back together for de Kleijn.
De Kleijn now sits sixth overall on general classification, 16 seconds behind Groenewegen, and fourth in the points competition.
Thursday’s stage 3 sends the peloton on the longest stage of this year’s race and features a similarly hilly finishing circuit to stage 2. You can watch the race live on GCN+ from 8:30 am – 11:30 am CT.
Stage 2 results
1 PEDERSEN Mads Trek – Segafredo 20 30 4:02:02
2 NIZZOLO Giacomo Team Qhubeka NextHash
3 GROENEWEGEN Dylan Team Jumbo-Visma
4 TILLER Rasmus Uno-X Pro Cycling Team
5 STEIMLE Jannik Deceuninck – Quick Step
6 DUPONT Timothy Bingoal Pauwels Sauces WB
7 DE KLEIJN Arvid Rally Cycling
8 THIJSSEN Gerben Lotto Soudal
9 VAN DER SANDE Tosh Lotto Soudal
10 SKJELMOSE JENSEN Mattias Trek – Segafredo
11 MENTEN Milan Bingoal Pauwels Sauces WB
12 VAN DER LIJKE Nick Riwal Cycling Team
13 JOYCE Colin Rally Cycling
14 BENDIXEN Louis Denmark
15 CAVENDISH Mark Deceuninck – Quick Step
