Lloyds Bank Tour of Britain Men 2025 Stage 2

September 3, 2025 Day 2 consists of a large 169KM counter-clockwise loop that starts and finishes in Stowmarket. The roads are very close to where we were yesterday and the profile is very similar as well. There is 870M of elevation gain which should produce another bunch sprint. In the final 3KM, there is only one turn, a left at 700M, that puts the riders onto the finishing straight on Ipswich Road. There was more rain around at the start than yesterday and also a bit more activity to get in the break. Ben Wiggins and Josh Charlton of the British National Team were there with Andreas Stokbro and Hartthijs De Vries of Unibet-Tietema Rockets, Baptiste Veistroffer of Lotto, and Rafael Reis of Anicolor-Tien 21. Unfortunately for Wiggins and Charlton, they both slid out in a wet corner as they were trying to establish a gap to the peloton. Both were able to get up but they could not manage to make it back into the break. Stokbro won the intermediate sprint in Stradbroke after 40KM of racing. Shortly after, rain started to fall heavily and would continue on and off for the rest of the day. Reis was dropped on the KOM of Semer Hill with 20KM to go as Stokbro accelerated to take the points on top. The break was caught with 3KM to go and the bunch were setting up for another sprint finish. Bahrain Victorious led through 2KM to go but just as Israel-Premier Tech were taking control, a crash in the middle of the peloton caused a split which put at least a third of the peloton out of contention. Bahrain Victorious regrouped and took the bunch through 1KM to go. Sam Watson of Ineos hit out very early at 400M and on his wheel was Olav Kooij of Visma-Lease a Bike. When Watson faded, Kooij came around and hit clean air just inside of 200M to go. He had more than enough power to get over a small rise in the road at 50M to go and crossed the line first for the second day in a row. Kooij put at least two bike lengths into Tom Crabbe of Flanders-Baloise who finished in second and Watson who hung on for third place. With the bonus seconds, Kooij extends his GC lead to 14 seconds over Crabbe in second and 16 seconds to Watson in third.