Spain's Samuel Sanchez shrugged off his 38 years to win the fourth stage of the Tour of the Basque Country Thursday after a thrilling tussle on the climb to Orio which left Dutchman Wilco Kelderman in the overall lead. Sanchez resisted a late attack by compatriot and former two-time Tour de France winner Alberto Contador on the final ascent to take victory for the BMC team on the final climb. Portugal's Rui Costa of Lampre won a sprint for second ahead of France's Warren Barguil (Giant) and Alexis Vuillermoz (AG2R-La Mondiale) who was fourth. Mikel Landa of Team Sky was 20th on the punishing run and as a consequence lost the overall lead to Kelderman of the LottoNL-Jumbo team. Kelderman now has a four-second lead over Colombia's Sergio Henao (Sky), a seven-second advantage over Landa, eight seconds in front of Sanchez and 10 seconds better off than Contador of the FDJ team. Sanchez, the Tour of the Basque Country winner in 2012, celebrated his eighth stage win on the race. "It's an important win, I am full of emotion," he told EiTB television. "This shows that we veterans are still here." Friday's fifth stage is 157km to Mont Arrate and features eight climbs. Demare misses Paris-Roubaix cobblestone classic Milan-SanRemo winner Arnaud Demare has lost his race against time to be fit for Sunday's classic Paris-Roubaix race his FDJ team said Thursday. Demare became the first French winner of a major cycling classic since 1997, sprinting to victory in Milan-SanRemo in March, but in last Sunday's Tour of Flanders the 24-year-old fell heavily picking up severe cuts and bruises. "Despite all our efforts to get him ready after his fall, regretfully he's pulling out," said the sprinter's team manager Marc Madiot. "It's too bad, but I'm out," Demare said. "I'll be back for the Giro," he said of the Tour of Italy in May. The Paris-Roubaix is a grueling race featuring 54km of roughly hewn cobblestoned paths in which cyclists race on semi-inflated tires. The race is often won by a more athletic cyclist than Demare but sprinters such as Tom Boonen in 2012 and John Degenkolb in 2015 have recently won the race known as "the Hell of the North".
