Max Poole and Oscar Onley take double top 5 for the team at Tour de Hongrie summit finish

Max Poole finishes third at the first summit finish of this year’s Tour de Hongrie, while Oscar Onley rounds off a strong Team DSM performance by finishing fifth.

After the start of the 179.9 kilometres long stage, a breakaway of five riders got formed, but the team took the initiative early on and helped to keep them within a reachable distance. As the race took on the final climb, for the second of three times, the first attacks went, with Oscar Onley covering the move for us. The three riders managed to bridge to the two remaining leaders from the original breakaway but got caught back around the 20 kilometres mark. There the team grouped up well ahead of the last ascent to the finish line. They came into the final climb in a great position and were there when the race kicked off with two kilometres to go. Max Poole finished third, not far behind the winner, while Oscar Onley showed great climbing legs after his attack earlier in the race, and finished fifth, not far behind Max. A strong showing by the whole team today, ahead of the second summit finish tomorrow.

Speaking after the stage Max Poole said: “I think we can be happy with how we rode today as a team, like the other days we were always together riding well as a block. We tried to push the pace a bit more once we got onto the laps and the guys did a super job to put Oscar and myself into a good place to fight it out and although we just missed out on the win we can definitely carry a lot of confidence going into tomorrow” 

Team DSM coach Phil West added: “We wanted to go for the stage today, as we thought this could be a good one for us. But we also wanted to protect the GC with Max. We decided that we should take some responsibility with INEOS and make the race a little bit harder and make some pressure early on. In the early final Oscar was away in a really strong group, but there was a big reaction from the other teams so it was caught again. We came to the bottom of the final climb with Tobias, Oscar and Max in a really good position to go into the fight in the super steep final. We can be really happy with the day, the teamwork was really on point with some really good commitment. A nice day to spend in a bike race and we look forward to another hilly day tomorrow.”