Six days into the Tour of Britain, Wout van Aert landed his third win out of five road race stages, taking a dragging uphill finish in the shadow of the Angel of the North at Gateshead. Paradoxically, however, in the overall standings the prolific Belgian remained 4sec behind the overnight leader, Ethan Hayter, who finished second to Van Aert in the decisive 10-rider sprint. In a mix of admiration and despair, Hayter glanced at his nemesis as they crossed the line, but although his overnight lead was halved, the 22-year-old had done well to survive a brutal 198 kilometres across the spine of northern England, with the help of his Ineos teammates, and particularly the young Spaniard Carlos Rodríguez, who stayed with him after Van Aert dragged nine riders clear on the final short sharp climb with 14km to the line. The previous 184 kilometres had taken their toll and only an elite group including five of the top seven overall managed to cling on in the Belgian’s slipstream: Hayter, the world champion Julian Alaphilippe – who still has a chance of winning, ending the stage only 21sec behind Hayter in the standings – and his teammate Mikkel Honoré plus Israel Start-Up Nation’s Dan Martin and Michael Woods. Alaphilippe’s Deceuninck-Quickstep team and the Spanish Movistar squad had attempted to split the race from the moment the peloton left Carlisle and headed south into the hills. After a long series of attacks and counters featuring the WorldTour teams seven riders moved clear, including Mark Cavendish and Tim Declercq of Deceuninck, and Van Aert’s Jumbo-Visma teammate George Bennett. With Bennett only 3min 18sec behind overall, the septet were never given more than four minutes’ leeway, meaning the pace remained high all day. The escape could have been more threatening, however, as some manouevring by Cavendish and Bennett eliminated the most dangerous rider in the move, Mark Donovan of the German team DSM, who was lying ninth overall and was forced to drop back to the peloton; as the race descended eastwards from the north Pennines, Movistar gave chase with DSM and Israel Start-Up Nation to set up a pulsating finale. “It really kicked off when Van Aert opened up, the race was in pieces,” said Hayter. “To be honest, I’m happy with second, I was on the limit at one stage.” Briefly, the young race leader was left behind by Van Aert, and after he and Rodríguez had linked up with the Belgian they had to fend off a threatening attack from Woods, who was swept up with four kilometres to the line. “I thought we might be able to surprise some guys but we ended up with all the favourites in the main group,” said Van Aert, who knew a sprint was looming when Hayter joined him, along with Movistar’s sprinter Gonzalo Serrano. The upshot was a “royal” sprint, Hayter sandwiched between Van Aert on the left, and Alaphilippe on the right, with less than two bike length’s separating them. It left the race perfectly poised, with the weekend’s stage finishes and six intermediate sprints all carrying time bonuses, meaning that a single sprint or a minute split in the bunch at the finish could prove decisive, with an even chance that Van Aert’s battle with Hayter would last as far as the final day’s finish on Aberdeen Esplanade on Sunday.