June 16/19 14:12 pm - Cote Takes Third Straight Stage Win, Zukowsky Wins Title at Saguenay

Posted by Editoress on 06/16/19
 

Team Canada's Pier-Andre Cote took his third straight stage victory on Sunday at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Saguenay, while fellow Canadian Nickolas Zukowsky (Floyd's Pro Cycling) wrapped up the overall title after four days and 445 kilometres of racing.

Cote was in a break that was caught with six kilometres to go, but came back to win the final field sprint ahead of Matt Zimmer (NCCH Elite p/b MGCC) and Jure Rupnik (DCBank Pro Cycling), with Zukowsky finishing ninth to wrap up the title with a time of ten hours, 54 minutes and 36 seconds.  Zimmer, after a five second time bonus for finishing second on the stage, was second overall by five seconds, with Diego Milan (Inteja) in third at ten seconds.  In addition to the Yellow Jersey of overall race winner, Zukowsky also won the Green (Points) and the White (Best Young Rider) jerseys.

"Our goal today was to break up the GC [General Classification] a bit," explained Cote.  "We had Adam [Roberge] sitting in third and I was back a bit [ninth], so we wanted to put pressure on the other teams, like Floyd's and Aevolo.  We tried really hard, and I was super impressed by the work from our four track guys."

"The objective to today was to win for the stage for sure.  Also to improve GC for Adam and myself.  We had to put pressure on for the whole stage, we did that.  On the bell lap I was in a break with Jay [Lamoureux]. Jay dropped me alone on the final climb - the goal was to put as much pressure on the race as possible to create opportunity.  We saw again today that riding aggressive is always the best and the best defence is to be aggressive. My move put me in a good position for the finish, and I was able to recover for the sprint."

"On the last lap we managed to isolate Nick Zukowsky, but it wasn't enough.  So with three kilometres to go we decided to focus on the stage win, so I just got in good position and did what I do best, letting the legs talk in the sprint.  Overall, I must say I'm really impressed - the four track guys were honestly amazing, for non-road specialists.  Today, they were just stellar.  They were able to put a lot of pressure on the other teams on the climbs and get up the road to support us.  It was an amazing project with Cycling Canada, and I look forward to racing against them next week [with his Rally UHC pro team] at Beauce."

"We won three stages, and I can't remember a project in recent years where we had that kind of success," said Team Manager Kevin Field.  "It's awesome to see the evolution of Pier-Andre as an athlete.  It was disappointing to tumble on GC a bit on this last stage; I really wanted to see Adam hang onto that position.  But, overall, we are extremely happy with the national team."

Field continued, "For Canada, I always come into these projects thinking about our overall positions in the global and America Tour rankings - thinking about Worlds and Olympic qualifications.  It is fantastic to see the success of our U23 riders, Zukowsky, [Evan] Burtnik, Roberge and Pier-Andre.  We should come out of Saguenay with 98 UCI points for our U23s - which puts us in a much better position for U23 Worlds.  Nick [Zukowsky] is a real talent; it's so rewarding to see him develop.  Burtnik and [Ed] Walsh both developed in our TRC program and to see the way they raced here was equally satisfying.  I'm always thinking about our 'pipeline' and we always want to see a nice balanced flow of developing young athletes.  I knew we had a talented generation coming up behind [Ben] Perry, [Alex] Cataford, [Adam] de Vos, [Nigel] Ellsay - and seeing it coming online this year with all these guys is very gratifying ... and perfect timing."

Zukowsky has done well in the Saguenay region before, winning the national criterium title here last year.  "I'm very happy, this is by far the biggest result of my career so far.  It's a good feeling to come away with this."

Zukowsky was consistent over all four stages, which made the difference.  "That's been my trademark; I can do it all pretty good - not the best at anything, but being consistent.  On the sprint days I can be up there getting some points and time bonus, and I can also climb pretty decently.  I started the race off pretty aggressively in Stage 1, racing it from the front, and the rest of the Tour was about managing the time bonuses and making sure I was near the front for the sprints.  It took a very good effort by my Floyd's team mates to defend the jersey."

Time bonuses meant that there were still multiple riders in a position to snatch the jersey away from Zukowsky.  "There were probably 15 guys within reach of winning the race if they got in the right move or got enough bonuses, so I have to admit that it was pretty stressful.  But I had 100% confidence in my team, because they've been showing it throughout the year with great results.  We didn't try to control the race, but more manage the pack.  Having the other guys on GC throwing bullets away on attacks while I could rely on my team mates actually helped.  I had to do a bit of work on the last lap, but I was always in control and knew where everyone was sitting."

"I've had a pretty good year, I've been pretty consistent.  I knew I was coming into this race with form and I was feeling good, and was confident.  But you never know.  On our team there are at least a couple of other guys who could have won this race."

Gord Fraser, manager of the Floyd's squad, who took their first Canadian stage race win at Saguenay, said, "We've been globetrotting this year, with a big block in Asia and the usual early season races in the States, so this is our first trip up to Canada this year under the Floyd's banner and I can't complain about how it went.  It wasn't a perfect performance, but it was good enough."

"To see Nick turn all those Best Young Rider jerseys he has won into something more substantial like the Yellow Jersey here at Saguenay is pretty exciting.  Nick was definitely one of our 'prongs', but we also had Travis McCabe, fresh off his Cascade win, and Keegan Swirbul, so we had different strategies.  But after the first stage when Zuke and Emile [Jean] made the GC break, it was clear that the race would be a time bonus race, and we switched from trying to pick off stages to consolidating on the Yellow Jersey and mathematically eliminating as many people as we could through time bonuses."

While there were still a number of people close to Zukowsky going into the final stage, Fraser, says, "it was looking pretty good for us going into the final stage.  A lot of things would have had to come together to really threaten us.  We had to have a good day by the guys to control the race, and we were maybe a bit too anxious - we brought back breaks that we maybe didn't need to.  Zimmer and Milan came into the final sprint with a chance, which was a bit nerve wracking, but the odds were pretty long.  We just had to have confidence that some guys could step up, like Cote.  It was an exciting race, the pack put on a really good show in Chicoutimi; super aggressive.  It was kind of risky for the organizers to reduce the stage from 150 to 95 kilometres, but the action was non-stop, with constant attacking and reshuffling, and it might have been a better stage with the shortening."

Results from the fourth and final stage of the Grand Prix Cycliste de Saguenay in Saguenay, Quebec.