Arvid de Kleijn and his ProTeam Tudor Pro Cycling beat some of the best sprinters in the world to victory on stage two of Paris-Nice on Monday.
The Dutchman timed his sprint to perfection in Montargis to take Tudor's first victory of 2024, and the second division team's first ever WorldTour victory.
With many of the favourites out of the final run-in, De Kleijn outsprinted Laurence Pithie (Groupama-FDJ) and Dylan Groenewegen (Jayco AlUla), after coming round Danny van Poppel (Bora-Hansgrohe) in the closing 200m.
Pithie, the 21-year-old from New Zealand, has taken the race leader's yellow jersey as a result of his consistency over the first two days.
The predicted bunch sprint finalé followed a largely slow day on the roads of northern France, as the wind failed to have any impact on the racing. Possibly as a result of sterner tests to come, the peloton seemed to take it easy on Monday, before things kicked off within the final 5km.
"It means a lot," De Kleijm said post-race. "I’ve been close a couple of times, and I was chasing a WorldTour victory. It’s nice to grab it like this. It was a great team performance, we stayed really calm. We have Matteo [Trentin] in our group, and he told us what to do… Today was all in for me, so it’s really nice to finish it up.
"I saw the last 200m and I was a bit boxed in by my own team. I screamed go left, and I was on the wheel of Van Poppel. I came with speed and could keep it to the line
"We are making big steps, and I’m also taking steps every year. I’m a little bit older than the rest, but it’s still nice to see I can make improvements."
Tudo Pro Cycling, backed by Fabian Cancellara, has made a step up this season, signing the likes of Trentin and Michael Storer, and now they have a WorldTour win to back it up.
It was a quiet day for the general classification riders, with little in the way of terrain to split the bunch, but the yellow jersey did change hands, with stage one winner Olav Kooij (Visma-Lease a Bike) absent from the front of the bunch sprint. Therefore, Pithie stepped into yellow, the first race leader's jersey for the young Kiwi.
RESULTS: PARIS-NICE STAGE TWO, THOIRY > MONTARGIS
1. Arvid De Kleijn (Tudor Pro Cycling ) 177.6km in 4:41:02
2. Laurence Pithie (Groupama-FDJ) at same time
3. Dylan Groenewegen (Jayco-AlUla) at st
4. Danny Van Poppel (Bora-Hansgrohe) at st
5. Gerben Thijssen (Intermarché-Wanty) at st
6. Sam Bennett (Decathlon-AG2R La Mondiale) at st
7. Dries Van Gestel (Total Energies) at st
8. Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) at st
9. Pascal Ackermann (Israel-PremierTech) at st
10. Mateo Sobrero (Bora-Hansgrohe) at st
PARIS-NICE OVERALL CLASSIFICATION AFTER STAGE 2
1. Laurence Pithie (Groupama-FDJ) 8:17:20
2. Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) at st
3. Olav Kooij (Visma-Lease A Bike) at st
4. Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease A Bike) at 4sec
5. Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-Quick Step) at 6sec
6. Egan Bernal (Ineos Grenadiers) at 8sec
7. Mathias Skelmose (Lidl-Trek) at st
8. Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Deceuninck) at 10sec
9. Sam Bennett (Decathlon-AG2R La Mondiale) at st
10. Jon Barrenetxea (Movistar) at st
