Peter Velits and Tejay van Garderen both had disappointing starts to the Criterium du Dauphiné but today they delivered strong showings in the fourth stage. The Slovakian was part of the early break and finished fifth on the stage while the American team leader made a late attack to take back 31 seconds of the time he lost on the Col de Beal.

BMC Racing Team's Peter Velits finished fifth after being part of Wednesday's breakaway and teammate Tejay van Garderen was 15th and also pulled back time in the overall classification at the Critérium du Dauphiné. 

Velits was part of a 13-man breakaway that escaped early in the 167.5-kilometer race. On the final climb before a descent to the finish, Yury Trofimov (Team Katusha) attacked. He soloed in 23 seconds ahead of runner-up Gustav Larsson (IAM Cycling) and 28 seconds before Velits arrived with a season-best result.

"During the stage, I felt quite good," Velits said. "I knew the last climb would be the most important of the whole stage. I tried to follow every move that went away, but I couldn't stick to everyone. Trofimov was the lucky one to get away."

Van Garderen also took his chances on the climb and finished with a small group 1:31 after Trofimov, taking back 39 seconds of the 2:38 he had conceded to race leader Chris Froome (Team Sky) on Monday's mountain-top finish.

"I was feeling good and was expecting more of a fight from the bigger guys on that climb since they had done so much work throughout the day to keep the break pretty close," van Garderen said. "But once they hit the climb, it seemed like no one was really moving too much. Some opportunistic guys started jumping so I thought I would give it a go myself."

Van Garderen is the BMC Racing Team's best-placed rider overall, 2:22 off the lead in 19th, heading into Thursday's 189.5-km stage that features six categorized climbs. Sport Director Yvon Ledanois said he liked what he saw from the team. All seven finished in the first 55 places and the result on the day moved the BMC Racing Team into third on the team classification.

"We knew the first day in the mountains would be hard for everyone," Ledanois said. "But now the results are different. Peter did a good job and Tejay was doing well, too. I think all the guys are now looking good for the coming stages."