Tour calms down, stage winner makes big move

BARRY HARCOURT/Southland Times

FIRST IN: A jubilant Logan Hutchings celebrates his stage win into Gore yesterday.

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A soothing balm was applied to the fractious forehead of the Tour of Southland yesterday after Monday's dramatic scenes.

Colourplus rider Logan Hutchings, who finished 99th in Monday's controversial second stage, unleashed a powerful sprint to win the third stage into Gore.

"We were quite lucky. I slipped away with about 20km to go with four others and got just enough gap to hold the peloton off. It was quite a good day after having to sit in the bunch while the break was up the road getting a few minutes."

Hutchings, who was a massive 11min 32sec down on leader Heath Blackgrove after the first day of the PowerNet-sponsored race, spent much of the stage working as his team's domestique – the guy who has to do jobs like carrying water bottles up to his team's leaders.

But he ended it like a perennial bench-warmer called on to the field in the last minute to score the winning try.

"It just happened to be that a little split happened and I was just in the right place at the right time. I had a little go and all you need is a little gap and that was enough to stay away for the win."

The result had re-energised the Colourplus team's attack after it lost defending champion Hayden Roulston to injury on Monday.

More accurately, it was the silver lining in a rather important grey cloud.

"After yesterday the team was pretty down after what happened and the situation which unfolded on the road," Hutchings, who by his own admission had a disappointing season in Belgium this year, said.

"To get a win today was a success for the team but it still doesn't really make up for being a man down."

Yesterday's 165km stage from Invercargill to Gore is the longest of the tour and can be a tough assignment.

Its length, rolling contours and variety of winds can make it a searching test, but yesterday's relatively benign conditions meant those who were flayed by the wind on Monday got a chance to unclench and recover.

That's not to say there wasn't any action.

Several riders with bigger numbers on their bike frame attempted breaks from the outset, but the peloton was able to reel them back in, almost with disdain.

None of the moves stuck as the yellow jersey of Heath Blackgrove and his zebra-striped Zookeepers-Cycle Surgery team worked hard to control the pace of the bunch.

Eventually, a break did get away with Bissell Pro Cycling's young United States rider Cody O'Reilly, Calder Stewart team-mates Mark Langlands and Ben King and Benchmark Homes James McCoy.

They managed to stay away until the tour had reached Riversdale and looped back on the other side of the Mataura River towards Gore.

However, there was no stopping Hutchings, who finished at the front of a group that included Paul Odlin (Calder Stewart), Ascot Park Hotel under-23 rider Wade Mangham in third and Invercargill's Jason Barlow (Placemakers) in fourth.

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