2026 Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Stage 4 Results & Recap
Stage 4 of the 2026 Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes is in the books. The final results and standings are below, followed by our recap of how the race unfolded.
Race Recap
American champion Quinn Simmons (LTK) took his first win in almost a year when he led in a 10-rider group that just managed to hold off the bunch in the final kilometer in Montrond les Bains. Simmons launched his sprint from close to 300 meters out, opening enough of a gap to see off all challengers in the dash to the line, where Finn Fisher-Black (RBH) took second place and Mattéo Vercher (TEN) was third.
The stage began in undulating terrain and with most of the teams aiming to put a rider or two in the break. As a result, the action was frantic and more than 60km passed before any breakaway group managed to establish a significant lead. It was Simmons who triggered this move on the second climb of the day, the cat 3 Côte du Temple, Andreas Kron (UXM) and Jordan Jegat (TEN) joining him.
Soon after, Pablo Castrillo (MOV), Raúl García Pierna (MOV), Matteo Vercher (TEN), Finn Fisher-Black (RBH), Jan Castellon (CJR) and George Bennett (NSN) bridged up to this trio. Sam Watson (NCI), Lars Craps (LOI) and Marco Frigo (NSN) then made it 12 up front.
Coming off the last of the day's categorized climbs, British champion Watson crashed heavily after puncturing on a descent, which relegated him to the bunch. Soon after Bennett suffered a similar fate, although the New Zealand champion did stay upright.
By that point, the break's advantage, which hadn't quite reached two minutes, had been cut to little more than a minute.
Team Visma | Lease a Bike, Cofidis, Bahrain Victorious, Alpecin-Premier Tech and Netcompany INEOS all committed riders to the chase over the closing 35km on the flat. With 15km left, the break's advantage was 40 seconds. 10km from home, it was down to 15.
At that point, the road switched from a northerly direction into the wind to a southerly path with the wind blowing behind the riders. The break took full advantage of this boost. With 5km left, they'd pushed the gap out to 20 seconds and with a kilometer to go it was still 10.
Castrillo drove hard into the final kilometer, hoping that García Pierna would benefit. However, Simmons moved first and very swiftly distanced his rivals, securing a first win since last year's Tour de Suisse.
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