Tour de Pologne 2024 Stage 1

August 12, 2024 The route started out easy enough for a typical Stage 1 but it only got more difficult and would likely turn out to be a GC day. It was a lively start but after about 8KM, a group of four got away including Jan Maas of Jayco AlUla, Szymon Sajnok of Q36.5, and Michał Paluta and Norbert Banaszek of the Polish National Team. Visma-Lease a Bike and UAE did the controlling, not allowing the gap to extend to more than about 2 minutes. The break knew they were doomed and started to fight for prizes along the way instead of working for a stage win. Sajnok and Banaszek battled for an Intermediate Sprint and sat up afterwards, leaving Paluta and Maas to continue on. The complexion of the peloton changed with around 35KM as teams started their positioning into the final two climbs on the day. The penultimate climb was gradual, ridden in the big ring. Paluta and Maas went over the top with 18.5KM to go and a gap of 1 minute 20 seconds. Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe drilled it on the descent and had the break caught with 9.5KM to go as the road tipped upwards again to start the final climb. Pepijn Reinderink of Soudal Quickstep attacked first with 5.4KM to go but the grade was quite shallow and the peloton was still large in numbers. He was caught just under 3KM to go as Visma-Lease a Bike drew him back but they were running low on numbers. The final kilometer got much more difficult and Jan Christen of UAE took his chance. Wilco Kelderman of Visma-Lease a Bike went with and the pair dangled off the front until 400M to go. Thibau Nys of Lidl-Trek attacked from the bunch, catching and passing Christen and Kelderman. He continued his effort through the line and took his seventh win of the season. Kelderman was able to hold on for second place and Lukas Nerurkar of EF-Education EasyPost came in for third.