Kaden Hopkins was just touched off in the fourth stage of the six days of Credit Agricole road race in Guadeloupe on Friday.

Hopkins, who is racing for the first time for Unisportlamentinois, the biggest team in Guadeloupe, found himself a marked man on the road in the opening three stages, finishing 27th, 62nd and 21st last week.

But Hopkins found better fortunes on stage four, with his pink jersey easy to pick out among the leaders as the day ended with a sprint finish but, despite his best efforts, he could finish only a valiant second behind Paul Daumont.

The Bermudian was pleased with how the day panned out after some setbacks on the opening three days of racing.

“It was really good today,” Hopkins said.

“Last weekend was a bit of a learning experience for me here because the tactics and the dynamics of the races are completely different, but I felt like I was figuring it out race by race and today I felt I raced really well.

“I definitely understood the tactics more and I ended up in a breakaway with two of my team-mates, it was probably a 20-man breakaway. It was a dynamic course so to get three of us in the group fighting at the finish was really good.

“We made a little bit of a mistake in the finish but we are still new team-mates and trying to figure it out.”

Hopkins is just two weeks away from one of his biggest races at the Pan Am Championships in Uruguay and is pleased with how he is shaping up.

“I’m happy with the way I feel form-wise as I haven’t had that much racing this season and one of my biggest objectives is coming up in the Pan Am Championships in just under two weeks,” he said.

“I definitely wanted to race to see how the sensations work and last week went all right, but today I felt very good and this race intensity will be a great last piece of prep before I head to Uruguay.”