UAE trio withdrawn from Tour of Portugal due to sudden time limit change: 'Even team managers didn't know'

UAE Team Emirates-XRG celebrated on Thursday: it was the very young climber Adria Pericas who claimed victory in the seventh stage of the Tour of Portugal. The 20-year-old Spaniard claimed his first professional victory, but far behind him, three teammates were timed out. What happened? It turned out to be due to a sudden change in the time limit.

UAE Team Emirates-XRG had an outstanding Tour of Portugal anyway, thanks to two stage wins by Julius Johansen in the prologue and the subsequent time trial. Pericas celebrated a victory in the seventh stage, securing the team’s third stage win. But Johansen was pulled from the race that same day, along with Marcos Freire and Luca Giaimi. “After some amazing days at the Tour of Portugal, it’s incredibly disappointing to see my race end this way,” he said on Instagram.

"I started my day by riding ahead of the peloton on my own for forty minutes," said the Danish sprinter. "Unfortunately, I crashed on the descent after taking a turn too fast. That was entirely my fault. After the crash, I decided to conserve my energy for the coming days and make it safely to the finish.” And so he settled into the team bus.

"It was a tough mountain stage, and the road book listed a time limit of 20 percent. There was no reason to take unnecessary risks. I ended up in a small group with my teammates Luca Giaimi and Marcos Freire. We calculated that the time limit would be well over 45 minutes, and we finished in just under forty minutes."

That seemed like enough, but it suddenly turned out not to be the case at all. “It wasn’t until after the finish that we were told the time limit had been changed to 15 percent.” None of the riders or team managers had been informed of this change, not even during the pre-race meeting with all the team managers. It’s incredibly frustrating to have to leave a race this way, especially since I felt I had so much more to give in the coming days.”

Johansen, Freire, Giaimi, as well as Andrey Braguini (GI Group Holding) and Pedro Andrade (Feirense - Beeceler), were forced to drop out of the race in painful fashion. “It feels all the stranger on a day when we rode a great race. Adria Pericas capped it off with an amazing finish, while the three of us were taken out of the race. I’m very disappointed, but that’s cycling.”