Europe 1 with AFP / Photo credit: 18:57, May 09, 2023

-a-doodle-doo! France's Aurélien Paret-Peintre won the fourth stage of the Giro in Lago Laceno. He won ahead of Norwegian Andreas Leknessund who took the pink leader's jersey. The French cyclist thus signs the third victory of his career.

Frenchman Aurélien Paret-Peintre (AG2R-Citroën) won the fourth stage of the Giro d'Italia on Tuesday in Lago Laceno by winning the sprint ahead of Norway's Andreas Leknessund, who took the leader's pink jersey. This is the third victory of his career, by far the most beautiful. The 27-year-old Savoyard climber used his speed point to raise his arms at the end of a long straight.

Between Venosa and Lago Laceno (175 km), the two men were the strongest in a breakaway of seven riders who resisted the return of the peloton in which Remco Evenepoel had, as he had announced, let slip the lead of the general classification so as not to lose too much energy defending it. The Belgian is now second overall, 28 seconds behind Leknessund, and two seconds ahead of Paret-Peintre, third.

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"My big goal"

"The Giro was my big goal of the year, I prepared myself thoroughly for these three weeks," said the Frenchman. Today I wanted to be in the breakaway. It's magnificent: we came to win a stage so it's great for my team." While Leknessund first broke away in the last part of the final climb, Paret-Peintre managed to get back on the flat in the last three kilometers to win. "I knew I was faster than him, so I waited until the end to make a difference," added Paret-Peintre.

Winner of the GP de la Marseillaise in 2021, and the Tour des Alpes-Maritimes et du Var at the beginning of the year, Paret-Peintre offers his AG2R-Citroën team its first victory in the World Tour (first division) in 2023. But there were two happy men on Tuesday as Leknessund, a 23-year-old climber, donned the leader's jersey for the first time at a Grand Tour. "It's really great, I wanted to win the stage because I didn't know if it was going to do it for the pink jersey. I put everything into an attack but my legs hurt so much. That was the goal this morning to take the pink jersey, but cycling is so hard. So it's just amazing to get there," said the Norwegian.