The second day of action at Arctic Race of Norway saw a relatively calm day in the saddle before the intensity ramped up in the finale. Team dsm-firmenich PostNL set out with similar aims as the opening day; go for the finish with Tobias Lund Andresen and look to try and take bonus seconds in the intermediate sprint if possible. In the last 20 kilometres the nervousness increased in the peloton ahead of a gravel section which unfortunately saw a crash that included Mees Vlot and Alex Edmondson, although both could remount and finish the stage. Further on, Lund Andresen suffered a puncture towards the end of the section and after a quick change he was brought back to the bunch by Bjoern Koerdt. In the peloton, Kevin Vermaerke should a good kick once again to take one bonus second in the intermediate sprint, moving up on GC in the process, before he helped Lund Andrsen. Unfortunately, the duo could never fully make it to the front and with Lund Andresen having spent quite a bit of energy to return, he sprinted to just outside the top ten on the stage.
Vermaerke said: “It was a pretty easy start to the day. Until the last 40 kilometres it was quite a controlled race so we just focused on saving energy. Then coming into that last hour we had quite some bad luck. Mees and Alex were involved in a crash just before the gravel sector and then Tobi had a puncture on it, so there was a bit of chaos. Tobi got a new front wheel and Bjoern did well to bring him back in the peloton. In the intermediate sprint I was able to take a bonus second which was good. I was then able to find Tobi a bit in the last five kilometres but unfortunately I couldn’t do one last push to bring him up into a good position; we were a bit too far back in the last two kilometres and got swamped. Once we hit the final downhill there was no moving up so we were on the back foot. It was good to see the commitment from everyone though and tomorrow will be a chance for the GC riders on the climbs so we will see how it goes.”