7th stage of Tour of California is coming up, and at this point, Zabriskie looks like the overall winner of this tour. Today's stage is flat, but there's a very short hill 20 kilometres from the finish line. Normally, it wouldn't be anything 'dangerous', but there may be a couple of GC-contenders who has eyed out the hill.
TV-break of the day was not exactly a bunch of new riders. I'm sure we have seen most of them before in other breaks, but here they go again: Illiano (Nintendo), Elmiger (Eurosport), Klimov (Domina), Devenyns (American Suzuki), Mori (Gazzetta), Mironov (Erste) and Kennaugh (Virgin) - a total of 7 riders with none of them being anywhere close on the GC.
These 7 worked very well together and established a gap of 10 minutes to the peloton. At this point, with 85 km. to go, Festina decided to start the chase wth support from Warner Brothers. Moments later, 50 km. to go, the gap is down to 4'15, and it's looking difficult for the breakaway riders. The peloton soon started 'weakening' though, and at times, the escapees even managed to increase the gap. With 25 km. to go, it certainly looked possible with a gap of 4 minutes - in fact, with 4 minutes, it will be impossible to get them. The group managed to get over the last hill with 3 minutes, and just 20 km. to go. All 7 riders are still there.
And the riders obviously knew that it was going to be between them. Devenyns attacks with 15 km. to go, but the other breakaway riders managed to neutralized it. Two riders weren't able to hang on to the increased pace, though -- Kennaugh and Mironov. Klimov also had to let go with just 5 km. to go, making it a battle between Mori, Devenyns, Illiano and Elmiger with Elmiger being the far best sprinter of them. Here's the four of them at the start of the sprint.
1 km to go, and Elmiger is meters ahead of the rest. Klimov has fought his way back to the front.
Elmiger takes the win ahead of Mori and Devenyns. Klimov looked very strong, but faded on the last meters.
1 minute later, Hushovd comes sprinting in, way ahead of the peloton.
Stage Result:
1
Martin Elmiger
EUROSPORT
4h12'29
2
Massimilliano Mori
LA GAZETTA DELLO SPORT
s.t.
3
Dries Devenyns
AMERICAN SUZUKI
s.t.
4
Raffaele Illiano
NINTENDO - HONDA
s.t.
5
Sergei Klimov
DOMINA VACANZE
s.t.
6
Thor Hushovd
FESTINA
+ 59
7
Bernhard Eisel
CARLSBERG
s.t.
8
Samuel Dumoulin
CREDIT LYONNAIS
s.t.
9
Assan Bazajev
SONY ERICSSON
s.t.
10
Lorenzo Bernucci
CARLSBERG
s.t.
11
Michail Ignatiev
ERSTE
s.t.
12
Eros Capecchi
FRANCE TELEVISIONS
s.t.
13
Tyler Farrar
FRANCE TELEVISIONS
s.t.
14
Vicente Reynès
EUROSPORT
s.t.
15
Joaquin Rodriguez Oliver
VIRGIN MEDIA - CAISSE D'EPARGNE
s.t.
16
Juan José Haedo
SLIPSTREAM
s.t.
17
Robbie McEwen
WARNER BROTHERS
s.t.
18
Ben Hermans
WIKIPEDIA
s.t.
19
Aleksandr Mironov
ERSTE
s.t.
20
Taylor Phinney
VIRGIN MEDIA - CAISSE D'EPARGNE
s.t.
Zabriskie keeps his leader and points jersey, Bernucci keeps his mountain jersey.
Edited by Roman on 16-10-2016 22:47
