Kangert finished fourteenth and was 2:12 behind stage winner Christophe Riblon in the 206km race from Val di Sole to the summit finish on Passo Pordoi. 

"The break was pushing hard today, and the teams couldn't pull enough back. I am satisfied with my condition coming back in, but you cannot say that I am happy with the result. We always want to do better," Kangert said on the Astana website. 

"After the Estonian national championships in June I took three weeks off at home. I'm happy to be back racing my bike, because after three weeks I need to go fast again. I did 11 days at altitude camp before this race, but I don't think that is enough," Kangert said.

Kangert has previously raced the Tour de Pologne twice before, in 2008 and 20909, but said a rest day transfer on Monday is a new concept, along with the introduction of six-man squads into the peloton even though he witnessed no radical change in the way the riders conduct the race. Some of the new concepts, reducing the size of teams for instance, were meant to increase the willingness of riders to go on the break as breakaways were supposed to be more difficult to control.

"It definitely makes it harder to control the escapes. It was a lot of stress for us, but probably it was more exciting for the spectators. Though after two days I can see that there is no real difference in how we race," Kangert said.