A hilly classic and Kjell Carlström in great form should be a good combination. But Nibali, Kreuziger, Sagan, Scarponi and several other strong riders will surely make him work for it.

Like on Coppa Sabatini Liquigas and Lampre have agreed that they don’t want any serious break. In the end Søren Nissen manage to get away with Ochoa and four other riders. With 90 km and most of the uphill sections to go the break has a lead of 6 minutes. While climbing the biggest hill of the day the break turns in to a four rider break and the peloton loses about 70 riders. Our biggest hopes Nissen, Carlström and Kreutzfeldt are all perfectly positioned. With 30 km to go Frusto prove to be the strongest rider in the break this day.



With 20 km to go Nibali put on the big pressure, and that is more than Kjell can handle today. Vincenzo got the front group down to 10 riders, but spend a lot of energy in the process.

Result:
1. Danilo Di Luca, Acqua & Sapone
2. Daniele Pietropolli, Lampre - ISD
3. Roman Kreuziger, Astana
11. Kjell Carlström, Falcon – Norheim

Kjell did indeed a good job today

Another hilly classic in Italy. And again Di Luca and Sagan will be among the favorites.
Off goes Philip Lindau while Acqua & Sapone, Liquigas and Astana are leading the peloton. With 70 km to go the 10 riders in front have a lead of 6 minutes. With a bit of luck they might make it!
35 km to go and 3 minutes lead. This is going to be close.
20 km to go and Lindau have lost his breakaway companions and had 1’45’’ to the peloton. Frusto cathes up with him with 15 km to go and the duo has 1’27’’ to the peloton, which gets torn apart by a huge crash. In the confusion following the crashDi Luca and Sagan goes on the attack in the peloton and with 3 km to go it looks like a group consisting of Lindau, Frusto, Di Luca and Sagan will sprint for the victory, but with 1,8 km to go another small group comes up from behind. Di Luca and Sagan have just been sitting in the back of the group and Di Luca makes good use if his routine to get the win.

Result:
1. Danilo Di Luca, Acqua & Sapone
2. Peter Sagan, Liqiogas - Cannondale
3. Liuwe Westra, Vacansoleil - DCM
7. Philip Lindau, Falcon – Norheim
9. Daniel Kreutzfeldt, Falcon – Norheim

The Season is coming to an end.
Before the last World Tour race of the season, Tour of Beijing, 4 teams fight to avoid relegation:

Orica - GreenEdge	363 pts
AG2R - La Mondiale	353 pts
Vacansoleil - DCM	326 pts
FDJ - BigMat	318 pts

Promotion should be fairly secure for Falcon – Norheim as 2nd best continental team on the CQ-ranking and leaders of the Continental ranking. Acqua & Sapone should finish as best continental team in CQ-ranking and thus securing promotion.

1st stage is an 11 km TT won by Alex Rasmussen. Gustav Larsson i 3rd winning a few points for Vacansoleil.
2nd stage ends in a bunch sprint won by Cavendish and with Barry Markus of Vacansoleil winning the team another few points by getting 2nd.
3rd stage is the only hilly stage of the race, and should be the GC decider. Juan José Cobo wins the sprint in a three man group along with Tiago Machado and FDJ - BigMat's Finnish rider Jussi Veikkanen. Jussi is now in the GC lead as well, securing a lot of valuable points for his team can they hold the lead throughout the race!
4th stage ends in a bunch sprint won by Kittel. FDJ - BigMat get another point to avoid relegation with Nacer Bouhanni's 5th place.
5th stage is another win for Kittel. A 4th for AG2R and another 5th for FDJ - BigMat. But Jussi Veikannen finished first in the GC and Benoît Vaugrenard won the Moutain Jersey for the team.

With the sensational race by especially Veikkanen FDJ - BigMat have managed to climb from 18th place to 15th place and that way getting another season in the World Tour. What a season finish!




The Swedish and Finnish cycling associations have announced that the upcoming Chrono des Nations will be the basis of the declaration of National TT-champions in the two countries. They have made the necessary arrangements for the relevant riders to participate.

Along with several other cycling associations Finland will announce its national road race champion based on the riders achievements at the end of the season.

Good call on the NC TT

Eiiii Gustav Larsson

Nice to hear that Falcon will be PT next season.

2013 will be a great season for the team

Falcon should be a force next season

Ian Butler: Thanks. It annoyed me a bit not being able to race them

Daggen: - With this form he will be a major favourite for the "Open Swedish TT-championship"...

Miguel98: We had to - otherwise Hushovd wouldn't join

Jakstar: At least it'll be a great challenge. We sent several World Tour wildcard applications throughout the season, but none got accepted.

sutty68: Thanks for the confidence. Force will probably be pushing it a bit. In 2013 the goal will be to avoid relegation...

Stevenson is both first Falcon and first Swede on the route, and in goal he has provisional best. When Lindau arrives Stevenson is still 1st.
First Finnish rider is Carlström. As Carlström approaches the 2nd intermediate time former Swedish TT-champion Bäckstedt is sent off. At this point several riders have beaten Stevenson in goal.
Kjell enters as provisional 24th. Now he just has to wait for Veikkanen and Helminen to come in.
Bäckstedt crosses the line in a good time, but will it be enough?
Last Falcon is Søren Nissen, who enters in provisional 11th. Now all anyone can do is to wait.

Results:

1. Bradley Wiggins, Sky Procycling

2. Janez Brajkovic, Astana Pro Team

3. Thomas De Gendt, Vacansoleil - DCM Pro Cycling Team

21. Søren Nissen, Falcon - Norheim

4. Gustav Erik Larsson, Vacansoleil - DCM Pro Cycling Team
13. Alexander Wetterhall, Endura Racing
19. Tobias Ludvigsson, Team Argos - Shimano
26. Fredrik Kessiakoff, Astana Pro Team
29. Magnus Bäckstedt, Falcon - Norheim
32. Thomas Löfkvist, Sky Procycling
33. Christofer Stevenson, Falcon - Norheim



11. Jussi Veikkanen, FDJ - BigMat
48. Kjell Carlström, Falcon - Norheim
53. Matti Helminen, Landbouwkrediet - Euphony

5th is teh Swedish TT and 2nd in teh Finnish TT. So close.

A good performance by the team, only the national jersey stayed out

A Good ride from Nissen in France to finish off the season

Rodriguez, Valverde and Kreuziger are among the riders looking for one last win this season, so there should be a chance of some good racing.
For a long time Haavardsholm and Brian Vandborg form a duo in front. The Dane isn’t doing much work though, so in the end they get caught by another 6 riders. Among them Alexander Wetterhall. With 70 km to go and a constant gap of 4’30’’ it seems like Movistar has it all under control.
With 20 km to go all but two breaker are caught and the favourites start doing their thing in the 25-rider group.



Visconti and Rodriguez get a small gap as Kreuziger can’t seem to follow them. Astana works hard not to let the two get a real lead and Kjell Carlström is sitting right in their wheel. At the foot of the last pass of the hill Kreuziger puts in the attack and Rodriguez goes with him. Having a lot of routine Kjell realize that this is a decisive moment and tries to follow them, but they are way too strong for him and he ends using a lot of energy on nothing.
Rodriguez get the last win of the season just as he catches up with a group of riders lost behind on the circuit. Kjell Carlström crosses the line in the 4th group.

Result:
1. Joaquím Rodriguez, Katusha
2. Roman Kreuziger, Astana
3. Alexandr Kolobnev, Katusha
16. Kjell Carlström, Falcon – Norheim

Well it looks like Carlstrom gets first pick.

Looks like Carlstrom is going to choose the Penthouse Suite

A great season it was, congratulations!

A number of cycling associations have for one reason or another failed to arrange national championships this season. In stead they have named the new champions based on the CQ-ranking at the end of the season.

These are the final national champions of the 2012 season:

Finland	Kjell Carlström	Falcon - Norheim
Argentina	Juan Jose Haedo	Saxo Bank - Tinkoff Bank
Belarus	Yaheni Hutarovich	FDJ - BigMat
Brazil	Murilo Fischer	Garmin - Sharp
Bulgaria	Danail Petrov	Caja Rural
Costa Rica	Andrey Amador	Movistar
Croatia	Robert Kiserlovski	Astana
Curacao	Marc De Maar	United Healthcare
Hungary	Peter Kusztor	Atlas Personal - Jakroo
Iran	Mahdi Sohrabi	Lotto Belisol
Japan	Yukiya Arashiro	Europcar
Latvia	Aleksejs Saramotins	Cofidis, le crédit en ligne
Malaysia	Anuar Manan	Champion System
Mexico	Flavio De Luna	Spidertech powered by C10
Moldova	Oleg Berdos	Utensolnord Named
New Zealand	Hayden Roulston	RadioShack - Nissan
South Africa	Daryl Impey	Orica - GreenEdge
Slovakia	Peter Sagan	Liquigas - Cannondale
Uzbekistan	Sergey Lagutin	Vacansoleil - DCM
Venezuela	Jose Rujano	Androni Giacottoli - Venezuela

You got Finland. Goo job