It was an early start on the first day in Romania: the bunch started the 175 kilometer stage at 10 a.m. The breakaway formed quickly. Two riders of Team United Shipping, Zétény Szíjártó and Luca Câmpean, were also in the group of at least 10 people. Apart from ATT, practically all the big teams joined the breakaway.
Unfortunately, Zétény struggled with stomach problems, and Luca stayed on the wrong side when the breakaway split in two. The stage was won by Austrian Maximilian Schmidbauer, and the best of the TUS rider was Nikiforos Arvanitou.
Zétény after his attack:
“Luca was our designated person for the break, I was just trying to help him, but in the end I ended up there, which I didn’t regret, because I thought we might even make it home. Except for ATT, every big team was included.
I felt a bit strange at the beginning. Luca went for the intermediate sprints, but he always had some problems. I was simply exhausted, but it turned out afterwards that my stomach hadn’t digested much during the day, so the fatigue is understandable. I had problems right after the stage… I’m trying to recover and somehow recharge, because we still have four important stages ahead of us.”
Luca attacked on home turf:
“It was actually great that there were two of us in the break, especially with such a big group that went away. I was the only one assigned to go in the break. To be honest, before the stage I was pretty sure that it would be a bunch sprint at the end. The climbs weren’t that hard and the last 20 kilometers were downhill. But since almost every big team was represented in the move, there weren’t many left to chase. For me, I just wasn’t fully concentrated when the winning move went away. I ended up in no man’s land between the groups for a bit, and eventually had to sit up. It’s a bit frustrating, but I learned the lesson for the future.”
📷Photo: Tour of Romania, Andrei Bălășan
