Czech Tour 2025 Stage 4

August 17, 2025 On paper, the final stage is harder than Stage 2 that saw William Junior Lecerf of Soudal Quickstep outduel Cian Uijtdebroeks of Visma-Lease a Bike in the final 300M. There is over 2,700M of climbing between Kroměříž and Pustevny across 179KM including the final climb to the finish which is 6KM long at 7.5%. The GC is likely a three man race between Lecerf, Uijtdebroeks, and Alessandro Fancellu of UKYO and will be won on strong legs and tactical nous. Twelve riders got away at the start and contested the intermediate sprint in Trojanovice and the first passage of the Pustevny climb. Nicolò Garibbo of UKYO took second at the top which gave him enough points to secure the Mountains Classification. Garibbo was joined in the break by Michael Boroš of Elkov-Kasper, Michiel van Vliet of Metec-SolarWATT, Loïc Bettendorff of Hrinkow Advarics, Michal Schuran of United Shipping, Šimon Vaníček of ATT Investments, Patryk Stosz of Voster-ATS, Ondřej Pokorný of TUFO-Pardus Prostějov, Dominik Amann of Vorarlberg, and yesterday's winner, Liam Walsh of CCACHExBODYWRAP. Their maximum advantage was 4 minute 15 seconds but with 53KM to go, it had been trimmed down to 1 minute 20 seconds with Soudal Quickstep and Visma-Lease a Bike chasing. Soudal Quickstep allowed the gap to extend out to almost 3 minutes and, with 45KM to go, Visma-Lease a Bike decided to take control to add more pressure. Walsh chipped off the front and the rest of the break just looked around at each other. Walsh built a lead of over 40 seconds while the others slowly drifted backwards, giving up any hope of a stage win. Bettendorff and van Vliet were able to get away from the chase group and they managed to bridge up to Walsh with 22KM to go but the gap back to the peloton had been cut back down to 90 seconds. The bunch barreled into the left turn to take them towards the bottom of the final climb to Pustevny. With the battle for position, the pace was intense and as a result, the last of the break was caught with 6KM to go. Visma-Lease a Bike tried to make it hard from the bottom but their team looked disorganized and the effort was choppy with bursts of speed then the power would come off. With 3.5KM to go, Uijtdebroeks sent his attack and was immediately followed by both Lecerf and Fancellu. Uijtdebroeks set the hardest pace he could manage and first popped Fancellu then Lecerf. Uijtdebroeks continued his push for glory and had nearly 20 seconds inside the last kilometer. Fancellu and Lecerf were caught by a chase group and their momentum picked up. They rode hard and with 200M to go, the gap was closing quickly. Uijtdebroeks tried to get everything out of his legs and was sprinting for the line but a move from Jannis Peter of Vorarlberg closed the gap and for a second day in a row, a Continental team beat the big guys and came away with a season defining win. Uijtdebroeks held on for second with Lecerf in third, all on the same time. If Uijtdebroeks could have held a gap, he would have won the overall but his time bonus was not enough and he had to settle for second overall, 7 seconds down on Lecerf. Fancellu finished in the front group and ended the Czech Tour with a third overall.