Hey guys,
I´m glad we have a warm team-bus here, because it´s cold as hell up in Norway on a bigger altitude even if we already have the end of may. The Tour of Norway just ended on top of a beutiful but icy mountain. Previously we were in Poland and California for some stage races as well, and all three had some interesting action for us.
Szlakiem Grodòw Piastowskich (2.1)
The short stage race in Poland had their toughest stage right at the beginning. The break was caught early, and as we had 3 riders for the victory here I decided to go a very long one as the pace slowed down in front of the pre-penultimate hill.
On top of the hill I thought about giving up, having still only an advantage of 20 seconds. Luckily than the pace in the chase slowed down a little, until I reached the final hill with 4 km to go and an advantage slight over one minute. Barguil came very near to me, but this time I made it and took the win!
1
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
4h44'23
2
Warren Barguil
Team Giant-Alpecin
s.t.
3
Stephen Cummings
MTN-Qhubeka
+ 22
4
Merhawi Kudus
MTN-Qhubeka
s.t.
5
Ian Boswell
BMC Racing Team
s.t.
6
Rein Taaramäe
MTN-Qhubeka
s.t.
7
Patrick Konrad
Bora - Argon 18
s.t.
8
Giovanni Visconti
Movistar Team
s.t.
9
Winner Anacona
Movistar Team
s.t.
10
Natnael Berhane
MTN-Qhubeka
s.t.
Stage 2 was just securing that jersey.
The stage was tough but not tough enough to bring time gaps between the main favourites. Phil won the bunch sprint for us, sadly behind three men surviving from the original break. I secured my GC lead.
On the ending TT I lost a couple of seconds, so that I missed out defending my jersey by three seconds. Luckily we had 3 riders in the Top 10, and I took the points jersey on top.
1
Rein Taaramäe
MTN-Qhubeka
9h18'59
2
Moreno Moser
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 2
3
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
+ 3
4
Stephen Cummings
MTN-Qhubeka
+ 16
5
Simon Geschke
Bora - Argon 18
+ 17
6
Winner Anacona
Movistar Team
+ 24
7
Natnael Berhane
MTN-Qhubeka
+ 31
8
Nathan Haas
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 33
9
Patrick Konrad
Bora - Argon 18
+ 35
10
Ian Boswell
BMC Racing Team
+ 37
With boosted confidence we went over the Atlantic to join the Tour of California, clearly the hardest American race, which is fitting great to my skills...
California was a main goal for us, and after an opening flat stage we tried to take the first chance on stage 2. After some minor climbs the bunch was already reduced, when I decided to try a small finesseur attack. Not me thing normally, but I saw the opportiunety when the peloton slowed down while catching the break.
The only man to see the danger was Tom Slagter, but he didn´t manage to chase us down. So we could celebrate the victory and surprisingly a time gap to Slagter and the others in Palm Springs.
After the stage I heard that there was a crash just outside the final 3 kms, which braught some main contenders down and slowed the pace of the chase. That smallered the joy of the victory, but still it was a great day for me.
1
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
4h26'41
2
Tom Slagter
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 22
3
Daniel Martin
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 1'10
4
Philippe Gilbert
BMC Racing Team
s.t.
5
Nathan Haas
Team Cannondale - Garmin
s.t.
6
Greg Van Avermaet
BMC Racing Team
s.t.
7
Stefan Küng
BMC Racing Team
s.t.
8
Damiano Caruso
BMC Racing Team
s.t.
9
Björn Thurau
Bora - Argon 18
s.t.
10
Isaac BolÃvar
UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling Team
s.t.
Especially when I started stage 3 riding in yellow! I finished this tough stage ninth, holding on to the jersey until stage 6.
There a huge 36km TT killed my advantage, so that Phillipe Gilbert took the jersey. I lost over two minutes, not only on Gilbert who seemed beatable on stage 7 but also on Mollema and Fuglsang.
So there was some crucial time to get for competing in the battle for the victory, but you know Mt.Diablo is long and sharp.
And everything worked out so nicely...Dan Martin attacked early and gained a quick advantage, while Mollema was under pressure. He gave me a free ride, but when Nibali attacked we had to react. I went after it together with Kruijswijk, still guided by the amazing Christian Mager who rode the race of his life.
I left all the others behind chasing Dan and putting enough time between me and the leader from Sky. On the last slopes of that crucial mountain I took on Dan Martin, beating him with a marginal time gap on top of the crucial Mt.Diablo.
1
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
3h45'53
2
Daniel Martin
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 8
3
Steven Kruijswijk
Team LottoNL - Jumbo
+ 1'21
4
Vincenzo Nibali
Astana Pro Team
+ 2'01
5
Christian Mager
Bora - Argon 18
+ 2'10
6
Bauke Mollema
Team Sky
+ 2'21
7
Jakob Fuglsang
Astana Pro Team
s.t.
8
Ian Boswell
BMC Racing Team
+ 3'38
9
Gianluca Brambilla
Etixx - Quick-step
s.t.
10
Eddie Dunbar
Astana Pro Team
s.t.
Mentionable the fantastic fifth of Christian.
The last stage was no trouble for us, so we could secure the GC victory in Santa Rosa.
1
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
25h20'38
2
Bauke Mollema
Team Sky
+ 1'13
3
Jakob Fuglsang
Astana Pro Team
+ 1'25
4
Daniel Martin
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 1'35
5
Steven Kruijswijk
Team LottoNL - Jumbo
+ 2'01
6
Philippe Gilbert
BMC Racing Team
+ 2'44
7
Toms Skujins
Hincapie Racing Team
+ 4'14
8
Vincenzo Nibali
Astana Pro Team
+ 4'16
9
Dario Cataldo
Astana Pro Team
+ 4'31
10
Ryder Hesjedal
Team Cannondale - Garmin
+ 6'18
11
Christian Mager
Bora - Argon 18
+ 6'51
Two stage wins and the GC over some big names, seems like this time time´s not working against me but in favour of me
Soon I will head on with the third and final part of this letter, telling you guys if I could hold on to my great recent form at the Uno-X Tour of Norway...
@trekbmc & DiCyc & The Schleck Fan: I appreciate every comment on this story, it adds some strength to my motivation of keeping this going. Thank you!
I really like this story although its a bit weird for me to see Andy as a german, but the story makes up for it(and you pretty much explained everything at the start)
The tour in one of the coldest regions of professional cycling. 3 stages of madness for sprinters, one for the puncheurs and then the big mountain top finish. And there was only one word for this climb: epic
The first three stages were out of my interest, as we had no sprinter here. Stage 4 was my first test, I managed to take the fourth place and secured a good position for the final day, while many favourites already lost some time.
Then stage 5 came, all was calm until we hit the last climb. And what a climb it was. Everybody for themselves, maybe the biggest time gaps on one stage of a race for a long time. I would like to tell anything about how the climb went, but it was just everybody riding their rythm after all blew apart from the very beginning. Uran and Kreuziger had a great battle for the stage and the GC, while I finished third getting stronger and stronger the higher we climbed. But it was still a time gap of over FOUR!!! minutes between victorious Uran and me finishing third. The following result is the stage result (not the GC), in the end Kreuziger gained enough time on Uran on stage 4 to win the tour by a marginal advantage.
1
Rigoberto Urán
Movistar Team
6h06'35
2
Roman Kreuziger
Tinkoff-Saxo
+ 32
3
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
+ 4'17
4
Peter Sagan
Tinkoff-Saxo
+ 6'02
5
Geraint Thomas
MTN-Qhubeka
+ 6'15
6
Peter Kennaugh
Team Sky
+ 8'29
7
Odd Christian Eiking
Team Joker
+ 10'41
8
HÃ¥vard Blikra
CULT Energy Pro Cycling
+ 11'10
9
Eddie Dunbar
Astana Pro Team
+ 11'51
10
Alexey Lutsenko
Astana Pro Team
+ 12'41
I placed myself on the lowest spot of the GC podium, still a nice result for me!
Now I will take a break with less races, as my next racing goals start in july.
Hey guys,
actually I only wanted to pull out a small update from my racing break. But there were some issues.
Firstly I want to announce that there will be no GT, as Bora just couldn´t get the wildcard for one. Racing the Tour will be FDJ, Bretagne, Orange and Adecco.
Therefore I decided to concentrate on .HC races, which can bring us many points to up our chances of participating in big races next year. We might even fight for promotion; our toughest opponents for that are Adecco and FDJ.
My achieved points are a big deal for us in that battle, being second on the continental circuit just behind Carlos Barbero.
The only WT races I might ride are the GP Plouay and the Vatenfall Cyclassics, just not sure about that. To be honest I mostly would be there for sponsoring issues.
Secondly I want to talk about my future goals. I lately felt really strong and am sure, that it´s worth compete a try to ride on WT level. On favour with my current team Bora, but if you want me to have another change just suggest the team.
My most appreciated scenario is to gain promotion with Bora this year, and have the ability to captain our squad in some races.
Thirdly I changed my training a little. As I am pretty big for a climber my goal is to use my heigth on the bike. Lately I put a lot of effort in training on my long term endurance, mostly on flat stages. For the future I want to not only look at the GCs of stage races, but also on the classics. Lately I had a lot of fun on smaller one-day races.
This will also help me in Tours, as I won't lose as much energy as now before the climbs start.
Fourthly I celebrated my birthday. It was a very nice day between the training sessions in Belgium and pre-race sponsor meetings in Köln. Frank managed to be there a couple of days with me. There were some nostalgic hours, looking back at our shared past. So we decided to meet ourselves next year more often, definitely on WT-events and hopefully at Le Tour again.
Furthermore I had the chance to have some pre-race training with the Stölting guys, who baked me a nice little orange-white-black-low-carb-muffin. According to Steffen and Ralph (our director sportives here) we had the pre-race street-view around Köln together.
Fifthly (I don't even know if that's correct english) there was the race itself. Originally I wanted to attack early on the tougher part of the 1.1 race to show our jersey. But somehow the Lottos, BMC and Etixx didn´t want to let me go, so the day was just chilling at the back of the peloton while Phil goes for a sprint victory...WRONG!...Phil came to me just before the last hill of the day to tell me that he's not feeling good. So it was an outlawed race for us now, everyone had the ability to search for their chances. I found mine with 8km to go, directly after the break was caught. Marcato initiated an attack, but the peloton didn´t let him go. As they caught him and slowed down, I went for glory myself.
Three conditions were in favour of mine: the race was pretty hard so not much domestiques left; Politt of Stölting was surprisingly still out there and sacrificed himself for pacing me a kilometer; and I am not known for my strong finesseur attacks on WT-level. So they let me go on the streets of Köln, which were flat as a plate and curvy as hell. Nobody wanted to put their nose into the wind, so I came all the way to the finish line to celebrate my most surprising victory ever in my new cycling-home Germany.
Marcato came in second after another late attack from him, while van der Sande took the bunch sprint...
1
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
4h54'16
2
Marco Marcato
Wanty - Groupe Gobert
+ 57
3
Tosh Van der Sande
Lotto Soudal
+ 1'26
4
Matteo Trentin
Etixx - Quick-step
s.t.
5
Dylan Groenewegen
Team Roompot-Oranje Peloton
s.t.
6
Simon Clarke
Team Sky
s.t.
7
Peter Kennaugh
Team Sky
s.t.
8
Thomas De Gendt
Lotto Soudal
s.t.
9
Salvatore Puccio
Team Sky
s.t.
10
Matej Mohoric
Team Cannondale - Garmin
s.t.
Another great day for us, upcoming is the German Championship. I won´t be looking at the TT, but if the race is fast I might do something on the road race. I would love to put on a national or international dress someday in my career...and winning with Germany is much easier than with Luxemburg. But getting the lead of a German Team is even hardedm and I will work as hard as possible to have a real chance of going for an international championship someday. Dreams...
Another win
Shame about not getting a wildcard for any GT though
But let Froome,Contador,Nibali and Quintana have their businesses and wins before Schleck crushes all of 'em in 2017
Hey guys,
I´m just exhausted right now. Three days in Baunatal are behind us soon, including the TT and the road NC.
The individual time trial was really short, just 16.6 km. I had an average day, so I had nothing to do with the victorious places taken by Arndt as a winner, Schachmann in second and Politt third. No team-mate of mine could deliver really well, Nerz was our best on P7. I have to mention that Tony and Patrick were not here so that´s why they don´t competed for the podium.
Road racing was much more promising. The 206 bumpy kilometers around Baunatal should normally be too soft for me, but you know lately all went pretty well on a terrain like this. I really attacked all day long to find some good groups, but there was always trouble. In the maon break we had Buchmann of Giant who did no work, so this attempt got lost. Later on I tried to initiate a group, but Giant only wanted to let me ride solo. I bridged over to Tenbrock, but we couldn´t bring on enouh resistance to make it into the final thirty kilometers. Another two attempts in the final ten kilometers later my engine was empty, So that my teammates went for glory. Bauhaus (3rd) and Schwarzmann (5th) did a very good job, but in the end couldn´t beat flying Greipel who took it in front of Kittel.
I placed myself eighteenth, not what I wanted but Giant was just too strong that day. Now my focus lies on the Tour of Austria, where Patrick and I will go for glory.
By the way, it´s great to see so much of you guys supporting my time!
Hey guys,
writing from the beautiful town of Salzburg in Austria. We were here to make some noise for Bora; the Internationale Österreich-Rundfahrt (2.HC) was clearly a highlight for Patrick and me. Especially the young colombians (Sebi Henao and Dayer Quintana) should be strong opponents, but it seemed like we were big contenders despite some other tough riders.
For the 8 days we had a strong team in the flat sections, but a lack of domestiques for the huge climbs to Kühtai and the Kitzbüheler Horn on the first two stages.
For Patrick it was the clear highlight of the season, so the team rode for him, leaving me in a free role. As soon as Konrad took over on the final 20 km climb up to Kühtai I let a small gap open to Patrick. So he went away, while others had to chase him up the mountain and I sat back on Dayers wheel, who was kind of the pre-race favourite.
With 2 km to go and only 4 men left chasing I decided to give myself a go to gain some time on them, making sure no one could stay on my wheel. Patrick was well in sight under the flamme rouge,
but I was happy to take second on the same time with him seing him celebrating on top of the first climb on his home tour.
1
Patrick Konrad
Bora - Argon 18
3h51'45
2
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
s.t.
3
Janez Brajkovic
UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling Team
+ 43
4
Dayer Quintana
Movistar Team
s.t.
5
Carter Jones
CCC Sprandi Polkowice
+ 1'13
6
Jonathan Monsalve
Southeast
+ 1'47
7
Cayetano Sarmiento
Colombia
+ 2'53
8
Lukas Pöstlberger
Tirol Cycling Team
+ 3'13
9
Pello Bilbao
Movistar Team
+ 3'33
10
Sebastian Henao
Team Sky
+ 3'42
Second stage was in no way easier, but we controlled everything and there was a big bunch climbing into the final mountain. Patrick was able to match all attacks, while I tried to mark Quintana up the mountain. But with 3 km to go everything changed. Patrick cracked out of a couple-up with Carter Jones, so I had to start chasing, bringing Patrick back to the fore. Jani managed to stay on my wheel, but as soon as I reached Patrick he had a hard time either. Patrick made a small weave as he had nothing left, giving me the sign to chase Jones on my own.
I tried to reach him, but at least I was nowhere near him on the line, but closing the advantage under one minute.
Luckily that meant we could secure the red leaders jersey, but not on Konrad's but on my shoulders. A battle of three for the GC began here.
1
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
24h25'39
2
Carter Jones
CCC Sprandi Polkowice
+ 21
3
Patrick Konrad
Bora - Argon 18
+ 24
4
Jonathan Monsalve
Southeast
+ 2'30
5
Janez Brajkovic
UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling Team
+ 2'34
Having the three riders uptop in half a minute we needed to contro the Großglockner stage as well as two uphill finishes. We did nicely and lost only some seconds to Henao, not a big deal for us as he was far behind. Only trouble was the TT to Podersdorf on stage 7. Mostly flat, and with me suffering a little we managed to fail the battle in a big way: losing the GC by just two seconds to Jones.
1
Carter Jones
CCC Sprandi Polkowice
24h56'24
2
Andy Schleck
Bora - Argon 18
+ 2
3
Patrick Konrad
Bora - Argon 18
+ 18
4
Janez Brajkovic
UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling Team
+ 1'55
5
Jonathan Monsalve
Southeast
+ 3'04
6
Dayer Quintana
Movistar Team
+ 5'02
7
Sebastian Henao
Team Sky
+ 5'15
8
Cayetano Sarmiento
Colombia
+ 6'26
9
Pello Bilbao
Movistar Team
+ 7'37
10
Lukas Pöstlberger
Tirol Cycling Team
+ 7'49
I tried to attack the man from CCC-Sprandi on the flat last stage, but there were neither bonus sprints nor a present by the sprinters teams to give, so at the end we had to take one of the biggest defeats in our teams history. Although the tears about losing the tour were bigger (especially with Patrick), we could add some immense points to our CQ-Ranking, which nearly guarantees us to reach promotion next year.
With this in sight, I decided to sign a new contract with Bora, a 1 year deal as usual. The team will be mixed up a lot, and with Dom and Sam leaving it will be tough next year. But some great additions were made, talents will develop, and I think we can look into a bright future. More in terms of this lateron in the season...
Next stop is again the Iberian Peninsula, having Klasika Ordizia and Volta ao Portugal in sight, before a final recovery break occures towards the late italian classics like Milano-Torino.
Somewhere cold in Norway, 29.5.2016 
Köln, 16.6.2016 
Salzburg, 13.7.2016 
