Place Name: Greenhill Road
Address: 1196 Greenhill Road, Uraidla South Australia 5142, Australia
Details: January 23, 2025
The GC men might have their first crack at making gaps today on a difficult route. The race starts straight up the 10KM Ashton climb after leaving Norwood. With about 43KM to go, the riders hit the first of two ascents of Knott's Hill. The finish line in Uraidla will only be 5.5KM from the top of Knott's Hill on the second time up, so a small group could work together to stay clear.
Dries De Pooter of Intermarché-Wanty was the first rider to get a gap on the Ashton climb and was joined shortly after by Fergus Browning of the Australian National Team, Ben Swift of Ineos, and Geoffrey Bouchard of Decathlon AG2R. Ide Schelling of XDS-Astana bridged up but that move caused a reaction from the peloton and it all came back together. Connor Swift of Ineos attacked next in the middle of the climb on a false flat. Browning bridged across and he led the pair over the summit with 137.5KM to go. The peloton shut down and the gap expanded to 90 seconds. Connor Swift got the call on the radio to sit up with 132KM to go which left just Browning off the front.
As the race went passed the Mount Lofty Botanic Gardens with 120KM to go, Bouchard jumped from the peloton to attempt to bridge 2 minutes to Browning. He made it just 8KM later and the duo set off to extend their 2 minute 20 second lead. Simon Clarke of Israel-Premier Tech was next to move at 109KM to go and snagged the last bonus second at the Intermediate Sprint with 107KM to go and dropped back to the bunch. The maximum gap for Bouchard and Browning got near 3 minutes with 66KM to go but teams were in color order and the speed was picking up. The break went over the top of Knott's Hill for the first time at 40.5KM to go with a gap of 50 seconds to the Jayco AlUla led peloton. It was a big fight to lead into the downhill for the final climb up Knott's Hill but Ineos was the team with numbers at the front to take on the descent. The descent did a lot of damage and left only about 20 riders in the front bubble at the start of the climb with 8KM to go.
Afonso Eulálio of Bahrain-Victorious was first to make an attack but Jayco AlUla set a pace and brought him back. Luke Plapp of Jayco AlUla had a go and then Rémy Rochas of Groupama-FDJ but they were caught and a group of 12 went over the top together. The pace went out for just a moment and Javier Romo of Movistar made his move. The group swelled and the gap grew. Numerous attacks tried to bridge but Romo kept his lead and saluted the crowd for his first professional victory. Jhonatan Narváez of UAE-XRG led the group in for second place, 5 seconds down with Finn Fisher-Black of Redbull-Bora Hansgrohe taking third.
Tags: Tour Down Under, 2025, January, Stage 3, Tour Down Under 2025, Norwood, Uraidla, Dries De Pooter, Fergus Browning, Ben Swift, Geoffrey Bouchard, Ide Schelling, Connor Swift, Simon Clarke, Afonso Eulálio, Luke Plapp, Rémy Rochas, Javier Romo, Jhonatan Narváez, Finn Fisher-Black