The first mountain-top finish of the Tour of Austria arrived on the second day of the race. The second stage was held around Bischofshofen, a city best known as one of the venues for the ski jumping Four Hills Tournament. A two-and-a-half-kilometer-long climb with a 7% gradient awaited the peloton at the end of the stage.
This time, Team United Shipping was not in the breakaway. However, the breakaway’s advantage never seemed sufficient to make it to the finish.
Only a small group of riders reached the foot of the mountain-top finish, led by UAE and Jayco. At the beginning of the climb, Alessandro Covi attacked, but the peloton approached the last few hundred meters at a tremendous pace, catching the Italian. Isaac Del Toro won the sprint, and 24 riders finished with the same time as the Mexican, including Bálint Feldhoffer. Our young cyclist finished in 13th place, while Erik Fetter came in 29th.
Bálint Feldhoffer’s thoughts after the finish:
“Last week wasn’t very good for me. I was only able to train properly for two days because I had a mild illness and was weak, so the focus was more on rest and recovery. That’s why the first day was simply too much, it basically shocked my legs, I couldn’t handle it well. But today I felt much better, it seems like yesterday’s performance has settled in. I was hoping to come back to my best today and fortunately I did, which is a good sign for the rest of the week. It’s a great feeling to come in a group with such names. I haven’t really cycled on long mountains like the ones coming, so I’m curious to see how it will go. I hope I can be there with the front group.”
Michal Schuran after two stages:
“It was quite an easy day. There wasn’t such a high pace on the first two climbs. It was easy to save energy in the bunch for the mountain top finish. However, from the last descent the peloton was really nervous and everyone wanted to go for a good position before the last climb. It was quite chaotic. We did quite a good job and we took the last corner around 20th place. The ascent started with a really high tempo and for me it was like a 2 km long sprint. I tried my best but I dropped 800 m to go. My powermeter didn’t show anything today, so I don’t know if I am that bad or everyone is so good. Tomorrow my goal is to go into breakaway because in every single stage I try to win the KOM jersey or most active rider prize to prove for the team I am not only here to fill the roster. So far I am not very satisfied with my performance. Fingers crossed for better legs in the next few days.”
📷Photos: Gergely Schöff