Tour de Suisse: Daryl Impey rolls back the years to win stage 4

Daryl Impey (Israel-Premier Tech) was the surprise winner on stage 4 of the Tour de Suisse after holding off a late charge from Michael Matthews (Team BikeExchange) in a reduced bunch sprint.

Søren Kragh Andersen (Team DSM) finished third on the line ahead of Alberto Bettiol, who was unable to finish off the work done by his EF Education-EasyPost team after they had set the pace for much of the final 15km.

“I’m ecstactic really. It was a tough day and the the competition is so good these days, with the young guys. After the accident that I had last year I didn’t know if I was going to be back here, so to finally pull off a victory after all the hardwork coming back, and the great team support and the support from my family, it’s great to be back,” Impey said.

Overnight leader Stevie William (Bahrain Victorious) was dropped on the final climb but fought back to finish with the leaders and retain his yellow jersey.

Impey, 37, missed a huge chunk of last year’s season due to a crash, and hadn’t won since taking a stage at the Tour de France in 2019. The veteran used all his experience in the final, allowing a small gap to appear in front of him after Bettiol had opened up his sprint from quite far out.

The South African then launched off Tom Pidcock’s (Ineos Grenadiers) wheel inside the final 150m to take the win.

Impey didn’t even appear to celebrate as he crossed the line, with Matthews coming the long way around to take second on the line. The Australian was the first to congratulate his former teammate after the finish, but Impey appeared almost stunned to have taken the victory.

“I felt good going over the last climb and I was in a good position there behind EF,” Impey said. “I thought that I’d lost it with around 800m to go, I thought that I was in the mix but the gap opened on the left and I just went for it. I was about to put my hands up but then I saw this blue flash on my left [ed. Matthews] so I had to do my bike throw. I wasn’t sure that I won.”

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How it unfolded

The early hours of the stage were marked by a three-man break after Matthew Holmes (Lotto-Soudal), Markus Hoelgaard (Trek-Segafredo), and Jimmy Janssens (Alpecin-Fenix). The trio established a small but steady lead over the course of the stage but with so many teams hunting a stage win their advantage never peaked above a few minutes.

With 25.6km to go the gap stood at 1:18 but the final climb of the day, the second-category Sattel at 175.8km was always going to be a decisive moment. One-by-one the breakaway riders were reeled in on the lower slopes, with Holmes the last man standing at 16km from the finish.

Gianluca Brambilla (Trek-Segafredo) set the pace and only 30 riders were left towards the top of the climb before Hugh Carthy took over. Marc Hirschi put in a short attack but with EF determined to set up a sprint for Bettiol the UAE rider was never allowed more than a handful of seconds.

Sébastien Reichenbach (Groupama FDJ) attacked over the top of the climb but he too was given little room by the team in pink. With 7km to go, and Reichenbach caught, EF continued to set the pace on the front.

Ineos came through with Geraint Thomas and Pidcock after the final tight right turn but it was the sprinters just behind the EF and Ineos train who benefited most, with Impey taking a huge comeback win.