THE final stage of tile Tour of the North yesterday - 68 miles from Larne to Ballymena - proved decisive and Englishmen took the first three places overall with Tommy Evans of the Ulster team having to settle for fourth.

A breakaway group of seven went away and arrived on the finishing circuit almost two minutes ahead of the main group that included Wayne Randle in the leader's jersey, and Evans, who was his closest rival.

Neal Ellison of the Energy squad won the stage from James Millar of Scotland and Simon Howes but Rob Holden, who was in third place overall, was fourth across the line and with Randle's group a minute and 50 seconds behind Holden emerged as the overall winner by 11 seconds from his Gill Airways-Peugeot team-mate Neil Hoban

Randle dropped to third at 55 seconds with Evans next a minute and 11 seconds in arrears.