Strade Bianche, white roads in english, is coming up again. The race goes from Gaiole in Chianti to Siena in 188kms. But thats not what this race is about. Strade Bianche was called after the special roads the riders ride on. Its a road of white gravel on which the riders will spend over 30kms.
Last year, the race was rather boring with Peter Sagan, just riding away. But this year, there will be some tougher opposition with once again Dan Martin, but also Bauke Mollema, Delfi Cervero, Rajesh Kahki, Carlos Betancur and others. Even if the best Team in the world, OPQS, is missing, it will be a tough race and the race decider should be the last steep, but also short climb in the finish. But if you thought that Strade Bianche has an uphill finish, you are wrong. The last couple meters, its downhill again, which could give Sagan the upperhand, if it should come to a sprint finish. Also we have something new this year. We asked some riders to put attach some GoPro cameras. We hope that those riders will have some action during the race.
Favourites:
Sagan(CAN), Betancur(ALM), Valverde(MOV)
Mollema(BEL), Martin(GRS), Cervero(AND)
Bernard(COL), Gerrans(OGE), Kahki(CSS)
Full startlist:
Belkin Jorge Cristobal Riquelme
Robert Gesink Bauke Mollema
Luis Leon Sanchez
Tom Jelte Slagter
Jasper Stuyven
BMC
Michael Albasini
Dario Cataldo
Fabio Felline
Chad Haga Adrien Hanzen
Georg Preidler Greg Van Avermaet
Simon Yates
Cannondale
Enrico Battaglin
Francesco Bongiorno Josh Burton
Hugh Carthy
Moreno Moser
Silvio Pennarossa Peter Sagan
Davide Villella
The time has come. Strade Bianche starts now. This is the route again:
After only 2 kms, Nieve(COL), Proni(NES), Von Triesenberg(TNE), Roth(CSS), Aregger(IAM) and Mate(KAT) attack and try to create a gap. They can extend their gap to around 2 minutes.
The first attack.
Only a few minutes later, another group tries to get away from the pack. This time, Traksel(VCD), Mori(LAM), Duran(EUS), Piedra(CJR), Paterski(CCC) and Van Niekerk(MTN) gain some advantage.
The second group starts to gain some time.
Androni and Garmin let them get away. They seem to be in no hurry.
After 18kms, those two 6-man groups unite and create the breakaway of the day, with some decent puncheurs. The pack should not let them too far away.
6+6=12
Here we have a great view on the break from our helicopter.
Soon, the break creates a huge advantage of around 5 minutes. It seems like Garmin and Androni, who still lead the pack are not feeling threatened by the break.
Meanwhile, our GoPro Cameras got their first use. Mathias Von Triesenberg, who was in the break delivered beautiful pictures.
Beautiful archway, filmed by Von Triesenberg(TNE).
Now the riders head onto the gravel. the roads are pretty thin and they have not that much grip, so maybe we will have some action here.
Beautiful perspective, filmed from Gorka Nieve(COL), while they head on the gravel.
Around 6 minutes later, the pack also arrives on the gravel roads, the Strade Bianche.
With 110km to go, the break has an advantage of over 7 minutes. A fan has sent us a picture, which he made out of his house. Great shot.
Great shot of the breakaway.
Sagan. Can he repeat his win from last year? Or will Dan Martin(right) or Valverde(left) beat him this time?
We arrive at one of the major ascents. Definitely not a game changer, but the location is beautiful and maybe we see the first riders drop out here.
The riders ride through a beautiful landscape.
Slowly, but steadily, the pack has increased the speed. at 85 kms, they reduced the advantage of the break down to 5 minutes.
During the fuel economy crisis, it is important to have an eye on the fuel prices. 1.53€ "for Sans Plomb 95". Thats quite expensive. Luckily the riders don't need to refuel their bikes.
The break works well together, even on those partly very steep hills. They have searched and found each other today. Great effort.
And it happened! The first riders got dropped with 80kms to go. But they managed to get back to the pack. Could've been worse.
Garmin pulls hard now at the front. They work for the Pot O' Gold with bad teeth, Dan Martin. Since Androni has, next to Cervero, no big firepower in the team, they have to let the heavyweight teams up front.
Another intersting GoPro shot, this time from Dan Martin, who positions himself near the front, with just 2 Teammates infront. 30kms to go. The break is only 3 minutes up the road.
As we can see here, Valverde sneaked his way up the field. He takes a last bit of water...
...and attacks right after. Great push. Martin(GRS), L.L.Sanchez(BEL), Verboven(EUS), Cervero(AND), Van Avermaet(BMC) and Sagan(CAN) follow him directly.
The Sagan group can extend their lead up to a few seconds, but the break of the day is still ahead.
Surprisingly, BMC sets the pace in the pack, even though they have Van Avermaet up front. Stupid or clever? Thats the question.(as you can see, because of the "?"
And BMC has caught the group, but Valverde accelerates again with 16km to go. This time, Van Avermaet(BMC), Cervero(AND), Gerrans(OGE), Cristobal Riquelme(BEL), Arredondo(CJR), Bernard(COL), Weening(OGE), Sagan(COL), Martin(GRS), Betancur(ALM), Verboven(EUS) and L.L.Sanchez(BEL) are with him.
Sagan wants to play Cat and Mouse as he attacks 3 times, only getting Cervero, Van Avermaet, Weening and Arredondo dropped.
Meanwhile, up front, Piedra tries to get rid of the other breakaway riders. But he gets caught fast, because he had put himself too much in the red.
Sagan attack once again. Can he get the others off his wheel? It doesn't look like this to me...
5kms to the finish. Mate attacks. So does Duran. They try to roll the dice. The Sagan group is around 30s back. Everything can happen now.
They are on the final hill now. 1km to go. A beautiful finish area, if you ask me. Roth(CSS) and Aregger(IAM) lead head-2-head into the ascent.
Roth opens the uphil sprint. Some get dropped, but Von Triesenberg can hold the wheel. But he tries to overtake Roth in the corner. Meanwhile, the Sagan group catched up to the break.
Another beautiful shot, by a fan. It shows us, how Von Triesenberg overtakes Roth.
Sagan gets blocked, while everyone else is sprinting.
Dan Martin can overtake a few breakaway riders, but it looks like he can't win it today.
Van Triesenberg wins Strade Bianche! What a surprise! He gave everything. He can't even lift his arms to celebrate. Great effort and what a spectacle the race was. Dennis Van Niekerk gets 2nd while Champion System can celebrate in communistic fashion about Roths 3rd place.
Bauke Mollema wins the sprint out of the pack, while being 10mins behind.
There are no fans to be seen, but some of the teams youngster may have had an long night painting the road for the big race, but "The Cannibal" has a strong team around him and will most likely not sit back and watch
Lol, the Cannibal is Merckx, not Cancellara. Edited by Shonak on 27-02-2015 06:53
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
You wait days for a race report and then three come along at once. Oman was a great result, but again for the wrong reasons. While I am delighted Niccolo won, I would have liked to see Viviani sprinting too.
Cervero's result in Strade is only disappointing in my opinion if you just looked at the results. It sounds like he stayed nice and active, but perhaps got caught out on the narrow roads, or when a breakaway rider was caught.
@Shonak: I think he means Sagan
Edited by The Hobbit on 27-02-2015 06:57
Disappointed that Verboven got blocked, but good tactics sending Durán in the break as well. I'll take all the points I can get. Still quite a bit more than the 0 points I got last year
Good report!
Edited by Atlantius on 27-02-2015 07:24
Okay:
Yay for Aregger
Denifl
Bonilla - Good experience and his first time riding with Carlos #1
trekbmc - Yay for news at last about WC game!
And I know it makes no difference but @preview Bonilla is an EPIC rider
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant." [ICL] Santos-Euskadi | [PT] Xero Racing
doing World Cup stuff right now 
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