The time trial in Roermond is fairly flat and with a couple of cobbled sections. The differences will be small, but could be relevant among the top riders in the GC. None of the riders in yesterday’s break is a favourite for today’s stage.
Oscar Freire did a good time trial, but the changing wind conditions meant that he was 1 second slower than his teammate Rein Taaramae. He crossed the line 3rd.
Samuel Sánchez was one of the favourites for the time trial, but he was worthless, crossing the line in the 62nd position, 9 seconds behind Taaramae.
Tom Boonen didn’t feel good on the cobbled sections and was 4 seconds slower than Taaramae, 18th when he ended the stage.
Rigoberto Urán was the last of the favourites for the stage to come out and the one to beat Taaramae’s time. He could only beat the Estonian rider by one second, but the rest of the field to come didn’t look strong enough to match the pace of the Colombian.
Michael Matthews, 4th in the GC, could only do the 91st time, 12 seconds behind.
Sylvain Chavanel wasn’t much better, 11 seconds worse than the best time of Urán.
Bart de Clerq was wearing the young leader jersey as he matched Chavanel's time and ended 78th overall.
Our leader, Steven Kruijswijk, was the last rider to take part in the time trial. He managed a decent time, 79th overall 11 seconds behind Urán.
Not much changed in today's stage, as the final differences were really small to matter. It is difficult to guess what could make someone not in the top positions win the Eneco Tour if it's not another breakaway.
The sixth stage takes place around the Belgian town of Genk. It is again a rather flat stage that could be set in a mass sprint.
A group of three riders tried to make a break succeed: Igor Antón (Euskaltel), Chris Horner (Radioshack) and Maarten Tjallingii (Sky). They were 6’ 30’’ ahead of the pack with 100 kilometres to go, but Rabobank was already starting to chase.
Maarten Tjallingii was the last survivor of the break when it finished with 21 kilometres to go. By then, Alexandre Vinokourov had suffered a puncture and wouldn’t be ready for the sprint.
Carlos Barredo attacked with 8 km remaining. It was really strong, and soon built a gap of 40 seconds to the peloton. Juan Jose Haedo jumped behind, but he didn’t look strong enough to catch the Spaniard.
Carlos Barredo wins in Genk! It is another win for Rabobank in a great Eneco Tour for the Dutch team. The pack sprinted fast to close on Haedo, but the Argentinean was able to grab the second place in the stage.
There is only one stage remaining in the Eneco Tour. It could be a good stage, as there are a lot of hills throughout the route. However, it is unrealistic to think that anyone not in the top 7 can snatch the overall win, as the peloton won’t have such a difficult time controlling the break this time.
We have a hilly stage to end with. Today the puncheurs are the favourites, as there is a 4 hills succession in the last part of the stage. Most of them will be fighting for the stage victory, while the few first riders in the overall classification can fight for the overall victory.
The third overall, Sylvain Chavanel, didn’t have a good start to the stage, as he suffered a puncture with 133 km to go. Fortunately, he could come back to the peloton with the help of some teammates as the rhythm wasn’t very strong at that stage.
Marco Pinotti and Levi Leipheimer were the two riders in front today. With a stage as hilly as the fourth, they could hope for a stage win if they were strong. The downside is that while the successful break had 9 riders, the two of them seem few. They had 9’ 30’’ with 100 km to go.
In the second sprint of Windraak the gap had gone down to 3’ 00’’, but with only 29 km to the finish the break had a chance of arriving.
The attacks in the main group started with 15 to go. In the first attack, a group with Chavanel, Bak, Urán, Brajkovic and Fuglsang formed. It left Steven Kruijswijk without response. This meant that the break had now little chance of succeeding, as the gap was now shrinking fast.
Kruijskijk used the help of his team to get closer to the front and attacked to join the front group. With 7 kilometres to go, Rigoberto Urán was on his own leading the stage and the group of favourites was 30 seconds behind.
Rigoberto Urán wins in Sittard-Geleen! The Colombian takes the third stage victory after a great week in the Eneco Tour. Behind him, the leader attacked from the favourites group and took the second place in the stage, 27 seconds back. The peloton arrived with a little bit more than 1 minute lost.
Steven Kruijswijk takes a surprising overall win in the Eneco Tour, and completes one of the main goals of Rabobank for the season. Among the pre race favourites, Rigoberto Urán was the strongest, taking three wins and a 9th overall.
The German soil appears for the first time in this story for the first of the two classics that precede the Vuelta a España. The Cyclassics take place in Hamburg and is probably the flattest of all the races in the World Tour. HTC will be looking for a good result at home soil, a much needed result for them as their only remarkable result of the season is the overall win in Romandie by Peter Weening.
Favourites:
- Jakob Fuglsang (Leopard): The Danish rider likes the flat and long classics, so this should fit him. Besides, this is one of the targets of his season. Fuglsang has only bagged one win this season, so he is looking forward to add to that count.
- Alexandre Vinokourov (Garmin): Alexandre was exceptional in the first part of the season; however, his recent form isn’t as good. His best chance is trying to force a quick climb to the small climbs to eliminate some of his rivals.
- Tyler Farrar (Saxo Bank): Farrar has already won 6 mass sprints this year, shining in a team with several stars. If no rider is able to break away before the finish his chances of victory are really high.
- Francisco Ventoso (Lampre): The Lampre rider is quick but inconsistent. He likes better the long stages, so he could do well in Germany.
The route around Hamburg for the Vattenfall Cyclassics is really flat. The only climb is the Waseberg, with 1km at 10% gradient.
A group of 6 riders was in front at the start of the race, including: Robert Gesink (Omega), Denis Menchov (HTC), Vasili Kiryenka (Liquigas) and Ivan Basso (Leopard). They had built a gap of more than 8 minutes with 140 kilometres remaining.
The group in front had grown to 11 riders by the time they climbed the Waseberg for the second time. Riders like Giovanni Visconti and Laurens Ten Dam had reached the front. However, the peloton was riding hard and the gap was only 1’ 25’’ by that time.
The break didn’t last long, and on the third climb the pack was leading. However, as the pack went over the top three Saxo Bank riders tried to go on their own: Sorensen, Cobo and Farrar. They were in the last kilometres, but it wasn’t going to be easy.
The Saxo Bank riders weren’t successful, and right after being caught Beñat Intxausti broke away. He topped the last climb alone with around 40 seconds on the pack.
A lot of doubts in the pack, as no team chase Intxausti. With 5 km to go he has 1’ 40’’ on the peloton, so his chances of wining are very high.
The Spaniard is ready to cross the line as the group starts sprinting. Its Vinokourov, Farrar, Leukemans and Urán for the second spot.
Beñat Intxausti wins the Vattenfall Cyclassics! A great attack by the Radioshack rider with 20 kilometres to go allows him to bag his second win of the season, but this is arguably more important than a stage in the Eneco Tour.
Tyler Farrar ends second ahead of Urán and his team mate Contador. The American will feel he could have won the classic if his team had chased Intxausti. It is a great season for him nevertheless. Urán is also proving that he found a better shape in this part of the season.
Farrar gets to the top of the World Tour rankings ahead of Vinokourov, while Intxausti progresses to the top 20 and Urán is 11th.
The route of the GP de Plouay is a circuit around the city of Plouay. The riders will do 9 laps around the 26 kilometres circuit, which has two climbs. The hardest is the second one, with 2 kilometres at around 7% and whose top is 8 kilometres to the finish.
A group of 9 riders broke away soon in the race, including: Peter Sagan (Liquigas), Mark Cavendish (Leopard), Chris Froome (Garmin) and Maxime Montfort (Omega). Sagan is a rather dangerous rider in this type of races, so it’s a surprise that the group allowed a break with him. The gap they were able to build was 6’ 50’’ with 100 km to go.
The wind was very strong during the race. You can see how tense the peloton is while Lampre, Leopard and Garmin are chasing harder. There are 74 kilometres to the end yet and the riders are already suffering.
Even though the pace in the pack was very high, the riders in the break are able to start the last lap with a gap of 2’ 20’’. Their chances of wining have increased significantly.
Janez Brajkovic is the first to start attacking in the first climb of the circuit (21 km to go). He is followed by Dries Devenyns and a bunch of favourites for the win.
Meanwhile, Matthew Goss attacked in the break and will start the last climb with 50 seconds on the rest of the break. There are a lot of doubts in that group, while 40 seconds behind is a group of favourites with around 15 riders.
The group of favourites catches the break during the last climb, soon after Jean Christophe Peraud tries an attack. However, with 8 kilometres to go, Matthew Goss is 1’ 25’’ ahead and looking good for the win.
However, the fight for the win was not over and right after Peraud, Janez Brajkovic did a terrific attack to catch Goss with 2 km to go. The only rider that could follow was Rojas, who stick to the Slovenian wheel as soon as he attacked.
41 seconds behind arrived a group of 7 riders led by the World Champion, Tom Danielson. Rojas is now 4th in the World Tour, after winning Poland and Plouay, while Janez Brajkovic is third, although without major wins.
The Vuelta a España is the Grand Tour that will be raced this season in this story. The route is not very balanced, favouring the climbers over the time trialists. In fact, there is only one ITT in Salamanca and the prologue is a short TTT in Benidorm. On the other hand, there will be a lot of mountain top finishes: Sierra Nevada, La Covatilla, Manzaneda, Angliru, La Farrapona and Peña Cabarga. Among the favourites, there are some of them that are betting all into this Vuelta, as their season has been disappointing. Among those are Jelle Vanendert, George Hincapie or Jean-Christophe Peraud.
Favourites:
- Hubert Dupont (Saxo Bank): The winner of the last Tour de France is the main favourite for this year’s Vuelta. He is one of the most complete riders in the story for GTs. Besides, he has a great deal of helpers, such as Sorensen, Contador and Sánchez.
- George Hincapie (BMC): George Hincapie is a great climber, but he’s not so good in the time trials. He is therefore favoured by the lack of TT kilometres in this edition of the Vuelta. However, he has had a poor season so far with no big results.
- Jelle Vanendert (Omega): The Belgian is the best time trialist among the favourites for the overall win, so he won’t be very happy with the lack of TTs. He has had a miserable season so far, especially as he suffered a fall in Romandie’s last stage as he was on course to be second overall.
- Xavi Tondo (Euskaltel): The Spaniard team is very focussed on this year’s Vuelta. Tondo proved that he can have good legs in the mountains, as he finished 2nd in Romandie. Besides, he has a great helper in David López for the mountains.
The Vuelta a España starts with a short team time trial in the city of Benidorm. The riders will have a small climb inland in the first 3 kilometres and will then go down towards the beach. The differences will probably be very small.
Liquigas was the first team to start, recording a 18’ 51’’. This is a good reference time for one of the candidates: Marco Marcato.
Omega records a marginally faster time (also on 18’ 51’’). However, they leave behind their leader Jelle Vanendert, who loses 7 seconds on his team mates.
HTC did a good time trial relying in the abilities of Tom Boonen. They set a time 4 seconds behind Omega Pharma Lotto.
Saxo Bank were the main favourites for today’s time trial but they couldn’t live up to the expectations. They could only match HTC 4 seconds behind Omega.
Leopard didn’t look very good before the stage, but they showed good fitness in this stage, as they matched HTC time, 4 seconds behind.
BMC was one of the last teams to hit the road, and they had a good day. They were the fourth team tied 4 seconds behind the Omega time. No other team was able to improve, so the Belgian team ended the day as winners of the stage.
The weirdest of things happened, as the yellow jersey was awarded to Marco Marcato. Some Liquigas and Omega riders were even awarded one second less than the time their team got. The losers of the day were the guys from Euskaltel, as they lost 15 seconds at the end of the day.
The next season calendar has been presented at the start of the Vuelta. The main highlight is the first appearance of the Giro d'Italia and the increase of the number of racing days to 70.
