Australian veteran Mathew Hayman deprived Tom Boonen of a record-breaking fifth Paris-Roubaix title when he won the Queen of the Classics yesterday after the leading favourites got trapped behind a big crash.
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Vanmarcke, Boonen, Stannard and Boasson Hagen took turns to attack, with Hayman, the rank outsider amongst the group, trying to save energy.
Matthew Hayman snatched victory in the Paris-Roubaix after a sensational sprint finish around the velodrome.
“It’s a long way out, but in the velodrome 200-metres is a long way when you have to come on the high side with exhausted legs”. I think Etixx (Boonen and Terpstra’s team) will try to make it a tough race because they have the most riders able to make big attacks.
“I broke my arm five weeks ago and missed all the racing, ” said Hayman.
“Today everything just fell into place”.
“I had a fracture in my radius of the right arm”.
“But if you look back, they’re pretty passionate about the race. I’m the same racer, I just don’t have the same shirt”, he added, referring to the fact he will ride the race for the first time in the world champion’s rainbow jersey.
Despite missing out on his historic effort, Boonen was gracious in defeat.
Lionel, Daniel and Richard analyse the race plus we hear from Hayman’s Orica-GreenEdge team-mate Luke Durbridge, Tom Boonen’s manager Patrick Lefevere and Roger Hammond, sports director of fifth-placed Edvald Boasson Hagen.
“So everyone was just in those last 4-5km looking a bit (at each other). Maybe riding without that pressure helped, I could tell in the final other guys really wanted to win”.
Demare, who recovered from a crash to win the prestigious Milan-San Remo classic last month, injured the right side of his body in the crash and did not feel fit enough to take part.
At kilometre 141, a crash split the peloton, surprising favourites Peter Sagan (Tinkoff), Fabian Cancellara (Trek) and Alexander Kristoff (Katusha), who sank once and for all after two punctures.
“One fall doesn’t change anything, it’s like that, it’s a unique race”, said the 35-year-old Swiss, who is retiring at the year’s end.
“I’d done months and months of training that starts in October”. That’s the way it is.
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Two days later, the dust is finally settling on one of the most thrilling editions of Paris-Roubaix in recent memory.
