PETER SAGAN CONTINUED to dominate the Tour de Suisse on Thursday with a fourth stage win from six attempts.

Nicholas Roche, meanwhile, came 31st, meaning he is currently in 5th place in the overall standings.

Sagan, riding for Liquigas-Cannondale, came from behind to win the sprint in Bischofszell from Sky’s Ben Swift and Orica-GreenEdge’s Allan Davis.

Movistar’s Rui Costa retained the leader’s jersey with an eight-second advantage over Frank Schleck (RadioShack-Nissan) and a 15-second lead over Roman Kreuziger (Astana).

With five climbs on the 198.5-km stage, four in the last 50km, there were numerous breakaways, with GreenEdge’s Michael Albasini among the prime movers.

Just 30km into the race Baden Cooke (GreenEdge), Vicente Reynes (Lotto Belisol), Matteo Montaguti (AG2R La Mondiale), Troels Vinther (Saxo Bank) and Rubens Bertogliati (Team Type 1-Sanofi) made a break.

Movistar rallied around leader Costa in the peloton and attempted to close a four-minute gap which had built up toward with approximately 40km of the stage remaining.

With five kilometres to go, Cooke and Reynes fell back to the pack as Montaguti and Vinther kept on fighting.

But the latter pair were also caught at the two-km banner, as Sky led the way into the final sprint before Sagan’s winning tilt.

Results in full:

Stage

1. Peter Sagan (SVK/LIQ) 4hr 30min 08sec (average: 44.1 km/h), 2. Ben Swift (ENG/SKY) same time, 3. Allan Davis (AUS/GEC) s.t., 4. Michael Albasini (SUI/GEC) s.t., 5. Oscar Freire (ESP/KAT) s.t., 6. Lloyd Mondory (FRA/ALM) s.t., 7. Marco Marcato (ITA/VAC) s.t., 8. Alessandro Bazzana (ITA/TT1) s.t., 9. Matti Breschel (DEN/RAB) s.t., 10. Francesco Gavazzi (ITA/AST) s.t., 11. Zdenek Stybar (CZE/OPQ) at 3sec, 12. Greg Van Avermaet (BEL/BMC) s.t., 13. Steven Kruijswijk (NED/RAB) s.t., 14. Jakob Diemer Fuglsang (DEN/RSH) s.t., 15. Wout Poels (NED/VAC) s.t., 16. Mathias Frank (SUI/BMC) s.t., 17. Frank Schleck (LUX/RSH) s.t., 18. Rui Costa (POR/MOV) s.t., 19. Robert Gesink (NED/RAB) s.t., 20. Alex Howes (USA/GRM) s.t.

Selected: 31. Nicolas Roche (IRL/ALM) 32. Damiano Cunego (ITA/LAM) 0:03, 45. Alessandro Petacchi (ITA/LAM) 0:03, 53. Levi Leipheimer (USA/OPQ) 0:03, 68. Tom Boonen (BEL/OPQ) 0:15, 91. Baden Cooke (AUS/GEC) 1:32, 99. Fabian Cancellara (SUI/RSH) 4:52, 100. Stuart O’Grady (AUS/GEC) 4:52, 102. Tyler Farrar (USA/GRM) 4:52

Overall

1. Rui Costa (POR/MOV) 25hr 23min 38sec, Frank Schleck (LUX/RSH) at 0:08, 3. Roman Kreuziger (CZE/AST) 0:15, 4. Thibaut Pinot (FRA/FDJ) 0:19, 5. Nicolas Roche (IRL/ALM) 0:21, 6. Thomas Lövkvist (SWE/SKY) 0:21, 7. Alejandro Valverde (ESP/MOV) 0:23, 8. John Gadret (FRA/ALM) 0:24, 9. Mikel Nieve (ESP/EUS) 0:26, 10. Tom Danielson (USA/GRM) 0:29, 11. Robert Kiserlovski (CRO/AST) 0:32, 12. Jakob Fuglsang (DEN/RSH) 0:33, 13. Levi Leipheimer (USA/OPQ) 0:37, 14. Chris Anker Sorensen (DEN/SAX) 0:40, 15. Giampaolo Caruso (ITA/KAT) 0:41, 16. Steven Kruijswijk (NED/RAB) 0:47, 17. Damiano Cunego (ITA/LAM) 0:57, 18. Vladimir Gusev (RUS/KAT) 0:58, 19. Robert Gesink (NED/RAB) 1:09, 20. Moreno Moser (ITA/LIQ) 1:13

Selected: 54. Oscar Freire (ESP/KAT) 9:39, 62. Peter Sagan (SVK/LIQ) 12:16, 71. Ben Swift (ENG/SKY) 13:47, 85. Mathew Hayman (AUS/SKY) 19:21, 86. Allan Davis (AUS/GEC) 19:55, 91. Alessandro Petacchi (ITA/LAM) 21:22, 95. Baden Cooke (AUS/GEC) 22:35, 108. Tom Boonen (BEL/OPQ) 27:32, 122. Stuart O’Grady (AUS/GEC) 34:28, 123. Tyler Farrar (USA/GRM) 34:31

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