Sep Vanmarcke won the queen stage of the Ster ZLM Toer today ahead of Wout Van Aert (Crelan - Vastgoedservice) in a sprint-à-deux in La Gileppe. The Belgian took the overall lead with victory, sitting five seconds ahead of Sean De Bie (Lotto-Soudal) with one day to race.

“This is a very beautiful victory,” Sports Director Nico Verhoeven said. “We already won with three different riders in this race. It’s almost impossible to do better than this.”

A numerous breakaway escaped in the beginning of the penultimate stage of the Ster ZLM Toer. Ten riders gained a maximum advantage of three minutes, but with only 35 kilometres to go, the difference was still two minutes.

“Vegard Stake Laengen [IAM Cycling] broke away on his own at that point and we decided to help in the chase to close the gap,” Verhoeven continued. “It was our goal to go for the stage win and the general classification with Sep Vanmarcke and we succeeded.”

“Sep already showed his strength during yesterday’s sprint preparation for Dylan Groenewegen so he should have been able to make difference in today’s stage. He finished it off beautifully.”

Sacrificed

Vanmarcke yearned for a win. He said, “I haven’t won a race since September 2014, so I felt that I really had the need to grab another victory. The whole team pushed to their limits to give me the chance to win this one. Timo Roosen sacrificed himself on the final climb and I broke away just before the steepest part. It’s a perfect scenario to grab the leader’s jersey, as well. I don’t have much of advantage, but it’s going to be very hard for De Bie to close that five-second gap. We’re doing a great job with the whole team this week and we’re ready to defend this jersey.”

Team LottoNL-Jumbo has to fight strongly to hold Vanmarcke’s small lead. “There are still 16 bonus seconds available,” Verhoeven explained. “The overall victory isn’t safe yet. We have to fight with the whole team and be focussed.”