Greg Van Avermaet (BMC) continued his love story with the Tour de Wallonie in today's queen stage of the race when the Belgian made a late attack to take a solo win in front of his teammate Daniel Oss. Behind, race leader Alexandr Kolobnev (Katusha) had a mechanical and so Van Avermaet also took the overall win for the second time just two years after his first victory.

The 500m, 9.4% Mur de Thuin climb in Wallonia suits Greg Van Avermaet down to the ground. When he won the Tour de Wallonie overall in 2011, he laid the foundations by taking a solo win on the stage that finished with a late passage of the short, cobbled ascent.

Today history repeated itself as the Belgian took another win in the final stage of this year's edition of the Belgian race which had the exact same finish. He attacked from the bottom of the climb inside the final kilometre and held off his chasers on the final 600m flat stretch to the line while his teammate Daniel Oss made a late surge to make it a 1-2 for BMC.

Race leader Alexandr Kolobnev (Katusha) appeared to have everything under control but a mechanical apparently prevented him from using the small ring on the steep slopes. Using way too big a gear, he fell far behind and lost the overall victory as a consequence, throwing away his bike in frustration.

The double victory for Van Avermaet sets him well up for his next target, the Clasica San Sebastian, which will be held in the Basque Country on Saturday. Starting at 14.45, you can follow Spain's biggest one-day race on CyclingQuotes.com/live.

A calm start

The 144,7km stage from Soignies to Thuin was set to determine the final overall GC of the 5-day race as two passages of the Mur de Thuin inside the final 13km should make its contribution to splitting up the peloton. From the top of the last passage, only 600m of slightly ascending roads remained.

Unlike the previous days, there was no big fight to get into today's early breakaway. Jerome Kerf (Color Code) made the first attempt and when he was brought back, the right combination took off.

Three riders on the move

Jack Bobridge (Belkin), Sebastien Delfosse (Crelan) and Boris Vallee (Color Code) managed to build up a gap of 6 minutes while Katusha of race leader Kolobnev just rode a steady tempo on the front. The Russian team was happy to see the break swallow up the bonus seconds.

However, other teams had different plans and so Omega Pharma-Quick Step and Cofidis started to chase. The two squads worked for Dries Devenyns and Nico Sijmens respectively, and Stijn Vandenbergh (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) and Get Joeaar (Cofidis) spent most of the day on the front.

The chase gets organized

Those two riders quickly brought the gap down to less than 3 minutes while the front group swallowed up the bonus seconds in the first two intermediate sprints and also took care of the KOM points on the day's first climb. That allowed Stijn Steels (Crelan) and Tiago Machado (Radioshack) to lock up their wins in the sprint and mountains competitions respectively.

In general, it was a very hot and calm day in the saddle as Vandenbergh and Joeaar just kept setting a stable pace on the front. With the gap down to 1.30, the front trio accelerated a little further, thus stabilizing the gap, while the battle for position had by now also become very intense.

Attacks from the front group

With 37km to go, Bobridge decided that it was time to go off on his own. However, Delfosse clawed his way back with Vallee in his wheel and the attack did no good to the cooperation. Finally, Vallee signaled that they needed to work together and so the collaboration was reestablished.

With 28km to go, Delfosse was the next to attack but Bobridge was quick to respond with Vallee in his wheel. Delfosse tried again a little later but had no success at all.

The group splits up

With 23km to go, Vallee made his first attack but that ended up being a very bad idea. Bobridge countered and that left the young Belgian behind. However, Delfosse and Bobridge were completely unable to cooperate and with 19km to go, Vallee had gradually clawed himself back up to the lead group.

With the battle for position now being very intense, Katusha moved to the front to set the pace and for a long time it was Rudiger Selig and later Maxim Belkov who did the work. With 16,6km to go, they caught the escape and despite Vallee's late attempt to stay ahead, it was all back together with 15,5km to go.

Offredo leads the peloton on the Mur de Thuin

As the peloton hit the bottom of the Mur de Thuin for the first time, Yoann Offredo (FDJ) hit the pace and led the peloton all the way up the climb. His teammate Anthony Geslin was 2nd on GC at only 6 seconds and was targeting the overall win.

At the top, a small group had a slight gap but as it came to a standstill, a 50-rider peloton gathered. BMC decided to make the race harder to suit Van Avermaet's characteristics and so Oss started to set a hard tempo. Kolobnev's teammate Alexander Porsev contributed for a short while until Pieter Serry (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) significantly increased the speed in an attempt to set up Devenyns for the win.

Berard and Evrard get a gap

Offredo went back to the front for a while but with 7km to go, Oss attacked. The Italian was a danger man on GC and so Porsev closed it down immediately. Instead, Julien Berard (Ag2r) and Laurent Evrard (Wallonie) made a move and those two riders managed to gain some ground.

However, the chase got organized as Porsev, Serry and Luca Paolini (Katusha) started to swap turns on the front and so it was brought back together with 5km to go. Behind 5th placed Bjorn Thurau had a mechanical and was now chasing hard to get back on.

Katusha in control

Paolini, Porsev and Mikhail Ignatiev all did a huge work to make sure that Kolobnev was well-placed for the final ascent of the climb until Danilo Hondo (Radioshack) took over. The German hoped that his sprinter, last year's overall winner Giacomo Nizzolo, could make it over the climb.

However, it was Taylor Phinney who made a late sprint with teammate Van Avermaet in his wheel and so the latter hit the bottom of the climb as the first rider. He made a huge acceleration while the group splintered to pieces. At the top, he had a solid gap over Tom Van Asbroeck (Topsport Vlaanderen) who was a little ahead of Jean-Pierre Drucker (Accent) with a chase group consisting of Marco Marcato (Vacansoleil), Olivier Chevalier (Wallonie) and Evrard a little further behind.

Marcato makes a last move

Those 5 chasers came together while Oss closed the gap from behind. With Van Avermaet far ahead, Marcato had to go from afar and his acceleration saw the chase group splinter to pieces, Oss and Chevalier the only riders being able to match the speed.

However, it was too late and so Van Avermaet soloed across the line to take his second win in Thuin in just three years. Oss beat Marcato and Chevalier in the sprint for 2nd while Drucker led a small group over the line 5 seconds later than Van Avermaet.

Troubles for Kolobnev

Kolobnev was struggling far back and crossed the line 25 seconds behind. Stopping to look at his gear problems, he threw away the bike as his first overall win in a stage race had just slipped away.

Instead, that win was taken by Van Avermaet who just continued his amazing run of success in the Wallonian event.

Result:

1. Greg Van Avermaet 3.28.01

2. Daniel Oss

3. Marco Marcato

4. Olivier Chevalier

5. Jean-Pierre Drucker +0.05

6. Paul Martens

7. Tim Wellens

8. Laurent Evrard

9. Dries Devenyns

10. Maxime Vantomme +0.08

General classification:

1. Greg Van Avermaet 22.08.02

2. Anthony Geslin +0.10

3. Alexandr Kolobnev +0.12

4. Daniel Oss +0.20

5. Marco Marcato

6. Jean-Pierre Drucker +0.26

7. Olivier Chevalier

8. Tim Wellens

9. Paul Martens +0.30

10. Laurent Evrard

Points classification:

1. Greg Van Avermaet 58

2. Daniel Oss 43

3. Romain Feillu 35

4. Jean-Pierre Drucker 33

5. Paul Martens 32

Mountains classification:

1. Tiago Machado 80

2. Tim Wellens 58

3. Ben Gastauer 40

4. Laurent Mangel 24

5. Marco Marcato 18

Sprints classification:

1. Stijn Steels 25

2. Christophe Premont 20

3. Boris Vallee 11

4. Laurent Mangel 10

5. Jack Bobridge 9

Teams classification:

1. FDJ 66.15.44

2. Topsport Vlaanderen +0.22

3. Lotto-Belisol +0.49

4. Cofidis +1.01

5. Radioshack +1.12