Alexey Lutsenko wins 2023 Presidential Cycling Tour of Türkiye

By Emre Asikci

ISTANBUL (AA) – Alexey Lutsenko of the Astana Qazaqstan Team won the 58th Presidential Cycling Tour of Türkiye on Sunday.

Lutsenko, 31, claimed the title of Tour of Türkiye with a time of 30 hours, six minutes, and 58 seconds, ahead of Ben Zwiehoff and Harold Tejada in the general classification.

Zwiehoff of Bora-Hansgrohe trailed 26 seconds behind Lutsenko, and Tejada of Astana Qazaqstan Team came third, 51 seconds behind the leader.

In a post-race press conference, Lutsenko said that the last time he came to Türkiye in 2018, he won a nice stage but he missed out on the overall victory by a narrow margin that he had to come back to win it.

"I came back with a lot of motivation and an excellent team. We have made the podium of almost every stage, it says a lot. I'm super happy to have won the race overall. I like this race a lot and it's a beautiful country," the Kazakh athlete said. " Looking at previous years, there was always one major climb to decide the race but this year, there were more. I've enjoyed the course even more this year. It was a good terrain for racing and at the end a nice stage in Istanbul."

Lutsenko Tuesday stormed a win in the Fethiye-Fethiye (Babadağ) stage, also known as the "Queen Stage" to gain a significant advantage and maintain his superiority until the end of the Tour of Türkiye.

He said that the Babadag stage is an impressive uphill finish with an extremely hard and long climb in which there is never a respite for taking a breath.

"You must do this climb with your head and never make any mistake. It was unknown for everyone but I was aware of the difficulty of this climb so I knew what to do. I gave 100%," the cyclist said.

Lutsenko heaped raise on the organizers of Tour of Türkiye, saying: "The organizers of Tour of Türkiye have put together a beautiful race this time with stages for pure sprinters, others for specialists of the classics and one for climbers.

"This event is growing. I like it so much so I'm looking forward to seeing if it can fit in my program for next year as well. If possible, I'll come back for sure," he underlined.

Lutsenko claimed the turquoise jersey as the general classification leader.

- Philipsen wins final stage of Tour of Türkiye

The green jersey went to Jasper Philipsen as the best sprinter in the Tour of Türkiye. Jay Vine took the red jersey, which honors the success of the mountains' leader.

Mauro Verwilt of the Tarteletto-Isorex team took the white jersey as the leader of treasures of Türkiye sprint classification, which refers to the paradise homeland.

In the grand final of the eight-day race in Istanbul, Philipsen of Alpecin-Deceuninck team claimed the stage eight win in two hours, 57 minutes, and 28 seconds to taste the fourth victory in the tour.

Cees Bol of the Astana Qazaqstan Team came second, while Giovanni Lonardi of the EOLO-Kometa team finished in third spot.

The stage eight kicked off in front of the Hagia Sophia Mosque. It reached Asia through the Eurasia tunnel, passed through the July 15 Martyrs Bridge, and reached the historical peninsula to Europe again for a magnificent finish at Sultanahmet Square.

Starting from the Alanya district of Antalya on Sunday and ending in Istanbul on Oct. 15, the cyclists traveled 1,235 kilometers (767 miles) on the Turkish Riviera.

The Presidential Cycling Tour of Türkiye, which is the only intercontinental bicycle tour in the world, hosted four world tour teams, seven professional, 12 continental, and one national team.

The Turkish Cycling Federation has been organizing the tour, earlier known as the Marmara Tour, since 1963. It gained international status in 1965 and was taken under presidential authority in 1966.

- Teams ranking

1 - Bora-Hansgrohe (Germany)

2 - Green Project-Bardiani-Faizine (Italy)

3 - Burgos-BH (Spain)