February was an eventful month for us. Two of our sponsors goals – both achieved by Kasper Jebjerg. Lots of good racing with podiums and top-10’s against strong opponents – and then off course the majestic victory Kjell Carlström provided – I bet Team Sky regrets not extending his contract now!
Rider of the month: Alessandro Petacchi, Lampre – ISD. This month have been a great month for sprinters and Petacchi have certainly been one of the best with a total of five victories and a bunch of podiums. Since no World Tour races were ridden this month Petacchi seems the obvious choice.
Several media approached the ambitious manager in the end of the month wanting to know how the roster would look next year. Allan gave the following comment:
We have already made sure we do not lose key riders. At the moment three riders haven’t gotten their contracts renewed. There’s a lot of interesting Nordic riders with expiring contracts we need to talk to before deciding further…
Todays race was completely flat, so the breakaway-riders were up for a tough one. Many tried, among the most active Falcon – Norheims Daniel Kreutzfeldt and Jeppe Lykke Hartvig Nielsen. But none could escape the savagely chasing peloton.
Having had riders in breakaway all day, the remaining Falcons hadn’t spent too much energy, and as the finish line got closer they showed a tremendous team effort with Magnus Bäckstedt and Jens Erik Madsen doing the leadout for their young team-mate Kasper Jebjerg from far out.
Falcon – Norheim started the sprint with Bäckstedt at the front, and even though many tried to pass they had dosed their energy perfectly and Kasper Jebjerg got his first professional win ahead of Alex Rasmussen, who was later that night seen talking to team manager Allan – wonder what that was all about?
Results:
1. Kasper Jebjerg, Falcon - Norheim
2. Alex Rasmussen, Garmin - Sharp
3. Koen de Kort, Argos - Shimano
"I'm really happy with the work Magnus and Jens Erik did for me. It was the first time we tried to do a sprint train. It didn't work perfect but very nearly so, and I never would have won this without them." - Kasper Jebjerg
The first 3/4 of the route was fairly uneventful. Not quite enough cobblesections on the route to make it difficult.
As the finish line is getting nearer Madsen, Bäckstedt and Jebjerg look at each other. Should one of them try to attack from far out?
That probably wouldn’t work as the speed was pretty high by now. Last week Bäckstedt started the sprint train, but Madsen never really got going. The three decided to try a new combination today.
At the 3 km mark Jens Erik Madsen starts putting pressure on in the front of the peloton at 3 km Bäckstedt take over and with 1 to go Jebjerg puts in his sprint perfectly timed and gets another win! Bäckstedt 4th
When our reporter was waiting for a comment near the Falcon - Norheim team bus he met another Danish rider, Alex Rasmussen, who "just happened" to be there. Alex gave a quick comment:
I am very impressed by the teamwork Falcon - Norheim shows. Kasper is not the best sprinter here, but now I have seen him win two races in a row thanks to extremely welltimed help from his two teammates. I hope, that I one day will experience such a dedicated team-effort for me!
Thanks. Was really surprised it succeeded, but the other sprinters lost a lot of distance because we started the train from so far out. Had the sprint been a bit longer they would have caught him I think.
Thanks for the support. We've had a good period in the early season, but we should expect the big stars to start getting in shape for the spring classics soon - and that will make it a lot harder to get results...
Today we didn’t manage to get a rider in the decisive breakaway, so we ended up doing a lot of work in the peloton to wheel in the breakaway. Carlström tried to attack from 5 km out, but couldn’t get away. That left Madsen as the only rider to help Jebjerg in the finish. That broke his winning streak and he had to make do with a 6th place. The riders did what they could, but just didn’t have the energy to make the sprint as hard and succesful as in the previous to races.
1. Manuel Belletti, AG2R La Mondiale
2. Cyril Lemoine, Saur – Sojasun
3. Laurent Pichon, Bretagne – Schuller 6. Kasper Jebjerg, Falcon – Norheim
One of the main races for us this month. Our sponsor want us to get a top 10 in the GC, but with a summit finish on the 3rd stage and a short TT on the 2nd it looks to be very hard. We have had our riders on a trainingcamp in the mountains up to this race to improve our chances, but it really isn’t our terrain.
Carlström should be our best rider uphill, but with competition like Wiggins, Froome, Rogers, Vanendert and Taaramae a top 10 seems a best-case scenario.
Stage 1 Carlström led the peloton over the first and only climb of the stage, securing the mountain jersey. With Bäckstedt back we decided to see of our sprinters train could work in a more high-profile race as this. Unfortunately a lot of teams tried the same and Jebjerg got trapped. Though it would have been quite a surprise had he beaten Sebastian Chavanel in the sprint. Near the finish the peloton broke in two. All the Falcon-riders were in the first group – very important thinking of the GC battle.
Stage 2 - TT
Todays TT was all about not losing too much time on the GC. Brink had 2nd best provisional and ended as best Falcon on 6th place. Carlström rode a good TT and only lost 24 seconds to Bradley Wiggins leaving him very much in the game before the deciding 3rd stage.
Mountain jersey: Kjell Carlström Young rider: Morten Kruse Brink
Stage 3
The deciding mountain stage. A few smaller mountains in the start could be the foundation of a breakaway, but we should expect to see the big names fight for the victory on the last climb.
Team Sky seemed very determined not to let the victory slip by mistake, so no one got very far away. Carlström was really happy about his polkadot jersey and took full advantage of team Skys hard work to pick up as many KOM points as possible without using too much energy. Before the last climb Carlström was leading the KoM classification with 16 pts to number two. That should have secured the jersey!
Up the last climb he fought the best he had learned sprinting to a 7th on the stage and a 8th in the GC.
Well, I couldn't have won the Mountains Jersey without Sky doing all the hard work keeping it all together - I'll have my sponsor send them a case of beer as thanks
Our sponsors want at least one day in the sprinters jersey in this race.
Stage 1
This stage consists of a lot of small hils and cobbles and is ridden like a real cobble classic. Short before finish Jebjerg gets caught by a crash and is out of the finale. Jens Erik Madsen is best Falcon-rider on 10th and the Sprinters jersey seems far away as Tom Boonen got second.
Stage results:
1. Fabian Cancellara, Radioshack - Nissan
2. Tom Boonen, Omega Pharma - Quickstep
3. Bert De Waele, Landbouwkredit - Euphony 10. Jens Erik Madsen, Falcon - Norheim
Stage 2
Tried to make it through the breakaway with Jeppe Lykke Hartvig Nielsen, as we could not expect to win a sprint in this field. Jeppe won the intermediate sprint, but it all ended in a bunch sprint. Now our train would stand its biggest test against a lot of top sprinters. The riders got a bit tired fighting for their place at the front, but got the train going perfectly. Today it became very clear, that Boonen, Goss, Kittel etc. is in a whole different league.
That night our reporter went to a small bar to try the Belgian beer. There in the darkest corner of the bar we met team manager Allan:
This was a really disappointing race. The guys really tried their best, but it appeared some divine power did not want us to succeed. Jebjerg crashing, the breakaways getting caught, sprints not working, no rhythm in the TT... And everything was going so well up to now.
Our reporter bought Allan a cup of coffee and took him back to the team bus comforting him that everything is gonna be OK and reminding him of the three wonderful victories within the last month.
Alessandro Petacchi, Lampre – ISD. This month have been a great month for sprinters and Petacchi have certainly been one of the best with a total of five victories and a bunch of podiums. Since no World Tour races were ridden this month Petacchi seems the obvious choice.
Matthew Goss, Orica – GreenEdge, 512 pts
David Millar, Garmin – Sharp, 355 pts
Kjell Carlström, Falcon – Norheim, 142 pts
Garmin – Sharp, 951 pts
Katusha Team, 900 pts
Falcon – Norheim, 298 pts
Germany, 1301 pts
France, 1133 pts
Denmark, 497 pts
Norway, 76 pts 
Dwaars door Drenthe 
Nokere Koerse 
Rein Taaramäe, Cofidis
Fabian Cancellara, Radioshack - Nissan
