Matthew Brammeier gave it his best in a five rider breakaway at the 157km Stage 3 of Tour de Romandie on Friday, and managed to stay up the road until the final 4.1km before he was chased down.
The five men - Brammeier, Gatis Smukulis, Leigh Howard (GreenEDGE), Tosh van der Sande (Lotto-Belisol) and Anders Lund (Saxo Bank) -- had as much as six minutes on the peloton. As the peloton reeled in the break to within 1'41" with 14Km to go, Smukulis attacked and Brammeier battled hard to stick with the other three as they tried to chase him down.
All were eventually reeled in leaving the peloton to scramble for the sprint. Luis Leon Sanchez (Rabobank) beat Gianni Meersman (Lotto-Belisol) and Paolo Tiralongo (Astana) in a very close photo finish. Serge Pauwels was the first rider of the Omega Pharma - Quick-Step Cycling Team in a 18th place.