The contenders duked it out in the final climb of the Queen stage at the Tour of Utah. Before the stage, 13 riders were separated by 38 seconds in the general classification but after slogging it over 14,778 feet (4,504 m) of climbing over a 98-mile (159 km) road race, the race now comes down to 2 pretenders to the title.
Utah native Jeff Louder (BMC) was triumphant in front of a home crowd and crossed the line first, pointing in pride at his jersey. Yellow jersey Blake Caldwell (Garmin-Chipotle) crossed the line in second place, 13 seconds back. With time bonuses on the line, Caldwell now has a 7-second buffer over Louder going into the final stage, a relatively flat 12-mile (19.3 km) out and back time trial that starts and finishes at the Miller Motorsports Park in Tooele.
Jeff Louder (BMC) points to his BMC jersey when crossing the line in front of an enthusiastic crowd
A break of 7 riders went off in the first 10 miles of the race, and got almost a five minute advantage before being caught on the HC climb up Alpine Loop at around the 55-mile marker. One participant in the break was green jersey Brad White (Successful Living), on his third break of the race, who nailed down the Sprint jersey as no one contended the sprints.
The lone survivor of the break, Mike Creed (Rock Racing) grabbed the KOM points before re-integrating the chasing dwindling field.
By the time the lead group made it to the bottom of the final climb to Snowbird, the numbers were down to about 25 riders with all the contenders present and ready for action. Oscar Sevilla (Rock Racing) was the first one to launch a move which caused ripples in the group. Garmin-Chipotle duo including Caldwell started to chase him down which caused the BMC duo of Louder and Darren Lill to react and chase the argyle pair. Meanwhile, KOM Glen Chadwick (Team Type 1) flew away, passed Sevilla and got a 20 seconds gap to the chasers, but Caldwell went after him and passed the Kiwi.
