Tomorrow I should have the next update and from then on I should be able to come back to posting updates as frequently as I did when this story peaked.
June 8:Skoda Tour de Luxembourg – Stage 2 | Schifflange > Differdange – 165 km
After a great ride on yesterday’s stage, Andy is in yellow and leading the greatest tour of his home country. Today’s course featured some undulating stretches but besides that it was more or less flat, meaning it’d be up to us to eliminate all threats that would occur today, so it can end in a mass sprint. We don’t have any particular sprinters for this tour, but Kurt is feeling pretty good and he’s a decent finisher, so if the opportunity offers itself, he might be in the deciding dash to the line.
Andy wore a leader’s jersey for the first time since Milano while his teammates helped him in doing so.
The break of the day consisted of Velits, Cheng, Lauscha, Lapthorne and Hach.
The was never dangerously ahead of the pack and after some hard work we managed to reel them in with 25 kilometres to go of the stage. So the stage was going to end in a mass sprint. Objective accomplished so far. We have no ambitions for Kurt in the sprints, so he had to find his way to the front on his own, which would cost some energy for the Norwegian.
Kurt tried his luck in the mass sprint, but he had to do the leading out by himself as we wouldn’t risk anything.
As we hit the home stretch, four trains would be in the fight for victory. In the middle Ceramica Panaria had their own train with Bongiorno leading out Mazzanti. To their left Bouygues was setting up Geslin with the help from Pichot. In their wheels, Greipel and Kurt loomed. In the right side of the road a bit behind the others Mark Renshaw was leading out Julian Dean and to their left, Hauser was leading out veteran Jan Svorada.
The Panaria train seemed strong at first with a powerful lead-out by Bongiorno as they powered away from Pichot who wasn’t quite up to the task. Geslin soon realised this as he bursted out of his countryman’s wheel and began hunting down Mazzanti who was currently leading on the home stretch.
The final dash to the line is on and Bouygues is leading.
Geslin soon raced past Mazzanti and the only rider going faster was Julian Dean who capitalized on a powerful lead-out by his teammates, Mark Renshaw. But it seemed as though he was too long behind. Kurt tried to follow Geslin and so he went past Greipel and he was nearing in on Mazzanti. But the finish line was too short off as he would drop to 4th as he was overtaken by Dean at the very last. He couldn’t touch Geslin though, who claimed a nice victory ahead of Mazzanti. Greipel took 5th.
Anthony Geslin of Bouygues Telecom took victory on the 2nd stage of Tour de Luxembourg to claim the lead in the Points Competition.
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 2 | Result
1 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM 4h31'14
2 Luca Mazzanti CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
3 Julian Dean CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t. 4 Kurt-Asle Arvesen TEAM CSC s.t.
5 André Greipel T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
6 Guennadi Mikhailov ASTANA s.t.
7 Alexandre Pichot BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
8 Jonas Ljungblad UNIBET.COM s.t.
9 Ruben Bongiorno CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
10 Mark Renshaw CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
11 Jan Svorada ERGOMO s.t.
12 Kenny Robert Van Hummel SKIL - SHIMANO s.t.
13 Harald Starzengruber ELK HAUS - SIMPLON s.t.
14 Jörg Ludewig TEAM WIESENHOF FELT s.t.
15 Daniele Colli CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
16 Theo Eltink RABOBANK s.t.
17 James Van Landschoot LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER s.t.
18 Javier Benitez Pomares BENFICA s.t.
19 Robert Mclachlan DRAPAC PORSCHE s.t.
20 Dieter Hauser ERGOMO s.t. 74 Michael Blaudzun TEAM CSC s.t.
75 Andy Schleck TEAM CSC s.t.
76 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
77 Luke Roberts TEAM CSC s.t.
78 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC s.t.
79 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC s.t.
103 Lars Michaelsen TEAM CSC + 3'45
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 2 | GC
1 Andy Schleck TEAM CSC 8h42'34
2 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM + 25
3 Rigoberto Uran UNIBET.COM + 42
4 Serhiy Matveyev CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE + 46
5 Stef Clement BOUYGUES TELECOM + 48
6 Christian Müller SKIL - SHIMANO + 49 7 Luke Roberts TEAM CSC s.t.
8 Rick Flens RABOBANK + 50
9 Mark Renshaw CREDIT AGRICOLE + 51
10 Aivaras Baranauskas AGRITUBEL + 53
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 2 | Points Competition
1 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM 45
2 Andy Schleck TEAM CSC 45
3 Julian Dean CREDIT AGRICOLE 30
4 Luca Mazzanti CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE 28
5 Rigoberto Uran UNIBET.COM 25
6 André Greipel T-MOBILE TEAM 24 7 Kurt-Asle Arvesen TEAM CSC 24
8 Jan Svorada ERGOMO 21
9 Mark Renshaw CREDIT AGRICOLE 20
10 Guennadi Mikhailov ASTANA 19
Edited by niconico on 04-01-2008 15:39
I think i ought to point out that in your picture of CSC pulling back the break, the fan on the side of the road isnt wearing trousers... interesting...
rjc_43 wrote:
I think i ought to point out that in your picture of CSC pulling back the break, the fan on the side of the road isnt wearing trousers... interesting...
I'm sorry that wasn't censored away, you should consult the admins
June 9:Skoda Tour de Luxembourg – Stage 3 | Wieltz > Diekirch – 155 km
The last but second stage of this tour through Luxembourg features a hilly last 50 kilometres, where we might see Andy’s rivals trying to shake him. But with the form he’s in I just can see that happen. The plan today is again to just eliminate all breakaways if they present a threat to the GC and then for Andy to stay with his opponents when the hills commence.
After a very chaotic start, 10 men got clear to form the breakaway of the day.
The break consisted of Kozontchuck, Zerzan, Silva, Totschnig, Van Hummel, Ludewig, Marino, O’Brien, Hansen and Cappelle. They were let go until they the 90 kilometres mark. From here on in the pack started chasing them down as their gap topped at 8’05”.
Immediately as the pack hit the hills it was all over for Lars Michaelsen, who hasn’t been in his best form in this race.
In the final 50 kilometres we were releaved by Bouygues Telecom and Unibet.com, who wanted to chase down the break by themselves. They didn’t have any trouble doing so as the gap was rapidly shrinking at this point. With 30 km to go they were caught.
Bouygues Telecom took charge as they wanted to set up Geslin for another win, but Andy had something else planned.
On the final hill with just under 20 to go, Andy took the front and put a devastating pace on the pack. Eventhough the pack was only cut to about 80 riders, this relay was enough to trap Geslin down the back, meaning he would have a lot of catching up to do, if he was to compete for the win and the GC today.
With 3 kilometres to go we have a mass sprint on our hands.
There was a Bouygues guy at the front but it wasn’t Geslin. It was Pichot, who gave a perfect lead-out for Astana’s Guennadi Mikhailov. Kurt-Asle was also at the front but some behind Mikhailov and eventhough he was coming fast, it didn’t look as though he would catch the Russian. Luckily for Mikhailov he had Theo Eltink in his wheel who isn’t a strong sprinter, but given his position on Mikhailov’s wheel he was able to hold on to take 2nd, behind today’s winner Guennadi Mikhailov. Julian Dean fought his way up to 3rd, while Kurt finished behind him in 4th. Geslin finished 6th, meaning he wouldn’t gain anything on Andy, so with one stage to go it looks like Andy will win the 2007 Skoda Tour de Luxembourg.
Kurt did well yet again in the sprint but he was too far behind to catch Mikhailov as he finished the day in 4th.
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 3 | Result
1 Guennadi Mikhailov ASTANA 3h50'05
2 Theo Eltink RABOBANK s.t.
3 Julian Dean CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t. 4 Kurt-Asle Arvesen TEAM CSC s.t.
5 Alexandre Pichot BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
6 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
7 Maarten Tjallingii SKIL - SHIMANO s.t.
8 Mark Renshaw CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
9 Luca Mazzanti CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
10 André Greipel T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
11 Jonas Ljungblad UNIBET.COM s.t.
12 Servais Knaven T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
13 Olivier Bonnaire BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
14 Ruben Bongiorno CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
15 Kenny Robert Van Hummel SKIL - SHIMANO s.t.
16 Grégory Rast ASTANA s.t.
17 Stef Clement BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
18 Thorwald Veneberg RABOBANK s.t.
19 Daniele Colli CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
20 Matthias Kessler ASTANA s.t. 24 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC s.t.
34 Andy Schleck TEAM CSC s.t.
35 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC s.t.
39 Luke Roberts TEAM CSC s.t.
40 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
64 Michael Blaudzun TEAM CSC s.t.
109 Lars Michaelsen TEAM CSC + 7'08
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 3 | GC
1 Andy Schleck TEAM CSC 12h32'39
2 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM + 25
3 Rigoberto Uran UNIBET.COM + 42
4 Theo Eltink RABOBANK + 44
5 Guennadi Mikhailov ASTANA + 46
6 Serhiy Matveyev CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
7 Stef Clement BOUYGUES TELECOM + 48 8 Luke Roberts TEAM CSC + 49
9 Christian Müller SKIL - SHIMANO s.t.
10 Rick Flens RABOBANK + 50 17 Kurt-Asle Arvesen TEAM CSC + 55
19 Michael Blaudzun TEAM CSC s.t.
21 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC + 56
45 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC + 1'05
47 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
108 Lars Michaelsen TEAM CSC + 18'01
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 3 | King of the Mountains
1 Georg Hach ERGOMO 16
2 Christophe Kern CREDIT AGRICOLE 12
3 Robert Mclachlan DRAPAC PORSCHE 10
4 Martin Velits TEAM WIESENHOF FELT 10
5 Adam Hansen T-MOBILE TEAM 10
6 Kai Reus RABOBANK 6
7 Daniel Musiol TEAM WIESENHOF FELT 6
8 Edward Clancy LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER 6
9 Darren Lapthorne DRAPAC PORSCHE 6
10 Mark O'Brien DRAPAC PORSCHE 6
I accedentally simulated the final stage and on top of that I forgot exporting the results – it’s a great start I know, but I’ll try to finish this tour off as smoothly as possible anyhoo.
June 10:Skoda Tour de Luxembourg – Stage 4 | Mersch > Luxembourg – 95 km
Double special today. Not only is Andy winning the Tour de Luxembourg, but the first warm-up race for Le Tour, Dauphine Libere, takes off. This obviously means that I won’t be in France for that race. Instead I’m going with the team to Holland in a few days for Veenendal-Veenendal, before I’ll take a very strong squad to Switzerland to hone Sastre’s form ahead of the biggest Grand Tour on the calendar.
About this stage in Luxembourg it wasn’t challenging at all. Like every other days none of the favourites were bothered to attack Andy, meaning we just had to reel in the early break and keep our Luxembourgian leader safe. We did and the stage ended in a mass sprint, which was won by T-Mobile’s André Greipel. 2nd in the GC, Anthony Geslin gained a few seconds on Andy as he finished 3rd on the stage, but no one could reach Andy who claimed the overall win, as a result of his fantastic performance on stage 1.
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 4 | Result
1 André Greipel T-MOBILE 2h23’19
2 William Bonnet Credit Agricole s.t.
3 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
4 Kenny Robert Van Hummel SKIL-SHIMANO s.t.
5 James Van Landschoot LANBOUWKREDIET-TÖNISSTEINER s.t.
Skoda Tour de Luxembourg - Stage 4 | Final GC
1 Andy Schleck TEAM CSC 14h55'58
2 Anthony Geslin BOUYGUES TELECOM + 17
3 Rigoberto Uran UNIBET.COM + 42
4 Theo Eltink RABOBANK + 44
5 André Greipel T-MOBILE + 46
6 Guennadi Mikhailov ASTANA s.t.
7 Serhiy Matveyev CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
8 Stef Clement BOUYGUES TELECOM + 48 9 Luke Roberts TEAM CSC + 49
10 Christian Müller SKIL - SHIMANO s.t. 18 Kurt-Asle Arvesen TEAM CSC + 55
21 Michael Blaudzun TEAM CSC s.t.
23 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC + 56
47 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC + 1'05
48 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
108 Lars Michaelsen TEAM CSC + 18'01
Georg Hach won the king of the mountains competition.
Anthony Geslin won the points competition.
Andy Schleck won the U/25 Competition.
Team CSC won the teams competition
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Prologue | Grenoble – 4,2 km
Team: David Zabriskie, Jens Voigt, Volodymir Gustov, Stuart O’Grady, Lars Ytting Bak, Martin Pedersen, Anders Lund and Allan Johansen.
As expected Dave rode a really fast prologue today and he nearly ended on top at the end. Unfortuneately for him, Bert Roesems of Predictor, had his best day ever as he just scraped off Dave by a gap as marginal as one sorry second. Dave needs to show he’s on form to earn a place in the Tour de France, but so far he’s shown his worth bringing. Jens, who’s building up his form, since being just about out of competition since finishing 2nd in Paris-Nice, also did good today finishing in 9th, 6 seconds off the pace of the Belgian winner. But neither Voigt nor Dave is strong enough to maintain their positions when we hit the mountain, so let’s hope we get away in a breakaway one of the days and claim a stage that way, otherwise Dave will have another chance on the long time trial on the 3rd stage.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Prologue | Result
1 Bert Roesems PREDICTOR - LOTTO 8'05
2 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 1
3 Victor Hugo Pena UNIBET.COM + 2
4 Andreas Klöden ASTANA + 5
5 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA s.t.
6 Roman Kreuziger LIQUIGAS s.t.
7 Niels Scheuneman UNIBET.COM s.t.
8 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 6 9 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC s.t.
10 Denis Menchov RABOBANK + 8
11 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
12 Stefan Schumacher GEROLSTEINER s.t.
13 Iker Camaño SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t.
14 Tomas Vaitkus DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
15 Matteo Priamo CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t. 16 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC s.t.
17 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK s.t.
18 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA + 9
19 Michael Rogers T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
20 David Cañada SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t. 23 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC s.t.
60 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 20
77 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 24
89 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 27
176 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 48Edited by niconico on 16-01-2008 15:16
June 11:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 1 | Grenoble > Roanne – 219 km
Right now I’m in Benelux after finishing the Tour of Luxembourg with the overall win to Andy. We have one Le Tour preparation team in France for this tune-up race, which today will feature a flat stage where the sprinters can fight it out.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 1 | Result
1 Allan Davis DISCOVERY CHANNEL 4h15'17
2 Baden Cooke UNIBET.COM s.t.
3 Oscar Freire RABOBANK s.t.
4 Daniele Bennati LAMPRE - FONDITAL s.t.
5 Wouter Weylandt QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC s.t.
6 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
7 Alexandre Usov AG2R PREVOYANCE s.t. 8 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC s.t.
9 Tomas Vaitkus DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
10 Stefan Radochla TEAM WIESENHOF FELT s.t. 45 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC s.t.
68 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC s.t.
111 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC s.t.
164 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC s.t.
172 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC s.t.
174 Anders Lund TEAM CSC s.t.
176 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC s.t.
Bert Roesem would retain the leaders jersey.
June 12:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 2 | Saint-Paul-en-Jarez > Saint-Etienne – 157 km
Another flat day and another sprinter would inevitably come away with victory. Stuey had troubles in the sprint so unfortuneately he couldn’t pull off another Top 10 result. Tomorrow I have a team of 6 riders with me in Holland for Veenendaal-Veenendaal, which is my last race before Tour de Suisse, where we will lineup an incredibly strong team. Also tomorrow we hope that Dave can run away with victory on the TT in this race, which suits him more or less perfectly.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 2 | Result
1 Allan Davis DISCOVERY CHANNEL 3h19'25
2 Daniele Bennati LAMPRE - FONDITAL s.t.
3 Baden Cooke UNIBET.COM s.t.
4 Paride Grillo CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
5 Oscar Freire RABOBANK s.t.
6 Stefan Van Dijck TEAM WIESENHOF FELT s.t.
7 Sebastian Siedler TEAM MILRAM s.t.
8 José Rojas Gil CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
9 Luca Paolini LIQUIGAS s.t.
10 Claudio Corioni LAMPRE - FONDITAL s.t.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 2 | GC
1 Allan Davis DISCOVERY CHANNEL 7h42'44
2 Bert Roesems PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 3 3 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 4
4 Victor Hugo Pena UNIBET.COM + 5
5 Baden Cooke UNIBET.COM + 8
6 Andreas Klöden ASTANA s.t.
7 Roman Kreuziger LIQUIGAS s.t.
8 Niels Scheuneman UNIBET.COM s.t.
9 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA s.t.
10 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 9 11 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC s.t.
12 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 11
13 Tomas Vaitkus DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t. 14 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC s.t.
15 Stefan Schumacher GEROLSTEINER s.t.
16 Denis Menchov RABOBANK s.t.
17 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK s.t.
18 Iker Camaño SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t.
19 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 12
20 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA s.t. 21 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC s.t.
61 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 23
74 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 27
163 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 51
165 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 54
Team: Juan José Haedo, Fabian Cancellara, Matti Breschel, Kurt-Asle Arvesen, Marcus Ljungqvist and Luke Roberts.
There’s not a lot of prestige on the line in this minor one-day race, but still it’s an important tune-up race for some of our contenders for our Tour team. Surely some riders are automatically in, but some riders can earn a spot if they show off some quality in these prelude races and here’s a great chance for the likes of Haedo, Arvesen and Breschel, who could all do well in this race. It’s a more or less flat circuit race of 15 laps. There’s a small hill on the course but it shouldn’t really cause any trouble.
A break got away containing five riders. They were Jørgensen, Kaupas, Zajicek, Cornelissen and Schubert.
Their gap grew incredibly high without causing any reactions from any of the CT teams. So if we wanted something out of this we had to hit the front immediately, as the gap was up 11 minutes with 100 kilometres to go. We however soon realized that reeling them in wouldn’t be any difficult, so we decreased the pace of the pack a bit after starting out really fast.
CSC taking control in the dark and misty surroundings.
With 40 kilometres to go the gap had been cut to about 2’30” so there would be no problem reeling the break in. But then something we didn’t expect happened. Three Belgians, Caethoven, Thijs and Scheirlinckx took off and bridged up with the breakaway extremely fast and shortly after they dropped the 5 riders.
The breakaway caused some other teams to take over the initiative in the pack and soon the early break was reeled in.
With 25 kilometres to go it was over for the early breakaway but the Belgian trio was still out there, looking extremely strong. Surprisingly they kept increasing their lead, which grew to over 2 minutes with 18 kilometres to go. This left Fabian with no choice but to attack. He got away from the pack and kept his gap to them pretty static.
Fabian gave it a shot but there was no catching the break alone – could the pack?
The pack couldn’t either as they rode at the same speed Fabian did, so the race would be settled between the three up front, with Scheirlinckx and Thijs being the favourites. Thijs led them out as they raced through the final turn and luckily for him he had Caethoven in his wheel who wasn’t able to follow, meaning that Scheirlinckx lost a lot of ground on Thijs. He would get around Caethoven though.
Thijs looked strong but could Scheirlinckx rob him – and would we even get into the top 10 – and what about Cancellara?
Scheirlinckx came up on Thijs fast and he looked set to go past him at one point. But he wasn’t able to after all as Thijs claimed the win and defended the honour of the ProTour teams. Caethoven finished 3rd. Cancellara looked strong enough for a long period of time, to snatch 4th but he faded on the home stretch and so he was passed by an uncountable number of riders. Haedo and Breschel were up there in the bunch sprint though and they took 6th and 8th respectively. But still a somewhat dissapointing result for us.
Erwin Thijs of Unibet claimed the win in this year’s Veenendaal-Veenendaal – Olaf Pollack won the bunch sprint.
Veenendaal-Veenendaal | Result
1 Erwin Thijs UNIBET.COM 5h14'09
2 Bert Scheirlinckx LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER s.t.
3 Frederick Veuchelen CHOCOLADE JACQUES - T. VLAANDEREN s.t.
4 Olaf Pollack TEAM WIESENHOF FELT + 2'02
5 Nico Sijmens LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER s.t. 6 Juan José Haedo TEAM CSC s.t.
7 Iljo Keisse CHOCOLADE JACQUES - T. VLAANDEREN s.t. 8 Matti Breschel TEAM CSC s.t.
9 Steven Caethoven CHOCOLADE JACQUES - T. VLAANDEREN s.t.
10 Sjef De Wilde LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER s.t.
11 Aart Vierhouten SKIL - SHIMANO s.t.
12 Hilton Clarke NAVIGATORS INSURANCE s.t.
13 Michael Mørkøv TEAM GLS s.t.
14 Peter Möhlmann TEAM REGIOSTROM-SENGES s.t.
15 Wouter Van Mechelen LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER s.t.
16 Denis Flahaut JARTAZI s.t.
17 Steffen Wesemann TEAM WIESENHOF FELT s.t.
18 Dimitri De Fauw CHOCOLADE JACQUES - T. VLAANDEREN s.t.
19 Stéphane Bonsergent BRETAGNE ARMOR LUX s.t.
20 Viktor Rapinski NAVIGATORS INSURANCE s.t. 26 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC s.t.
38 Kurt-Asle Arvesen TEAM CSC s.t.
43 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC s.t.
85 Luke Roberts TEAM CSC s.t.
June 13:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 3 | Anneyron > Anneyron – 40,7 km
Dave was looking for a win today but unfortuneately he wasn’t able to keep the same pace as on the prologue. He finished the day in 4th and remained 3rd in the GC. Klöden would take over the lead.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 3 | Result
1 Andreas Klöden ASTANA 46'46
2 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK + 10
3 Roman Kreuziger LIQUIGAS + 11 4 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 16
5 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA + 18
6 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 25
7 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM + 27
8 Victor Hugo Pena UNIBET.COM + 33
9 Bert Roesems PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 38
10 Tomas Vaitkus DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 45
11 Jason McCartney DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 49
12 Michael Rogers T-MOBILE TEAM + 50
13 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 51
14 Cadel Evans PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 55
15 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 59
16 Ronny Scholz GEROLSTEINER + 1'03
17 Antonio Colom ASTANA + 1'05
18 Manuel Quinziato LIQUIGAS + 1'08
19 Benoit Vaugrenard FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 1'11
20 Michiel Elijzen COFIDIS + 1'12 37 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 1'58
42 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC + 2'15
44 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC + 2'20
60 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 3'03
77 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 3'45
141 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 6'34
144 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 6'41
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 3 | GC
1 Andreas Klöden ASTANA 8h29'38
2 Roman Kreuziger LIQUIGAS + 11 3 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 12
4 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK + 13
5 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA + 18
6 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 26
7 Victor Hugo Pena UNIBET.COM + 30
8 Bert Roesems PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 33
9 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
10 Tomas Vaitkus DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 48
Andreas Klöden looks sharp about a month before Le Tour commences.
June 14:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 4 | Hauterives > Mont Ventoux – 197 km
In two days I’m ready to take off in Tour de Suisse but until then, there’s still two stages of this race that needs to be done. Today features the classic stage to Mont Ventoux and we’ll probably see Dave drop in the GC, where he right now occupies 3rd place. He did drop back as he actually fell all the way out of the top 10 to 11th in the GC. Andreas Klöden remains in yellow as he stayed with the 7-man group that made it to the finish, from which Alejandro Valverde took the win.
June 15:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 5 | Nyons > Dignes-les-bains – 195 km
Today the riders are off on a hilly course and it could cause a small stir in the GC eventhough we’ll most likely see the favourites work as little as possible ahead of the crucial mountain stage tomorrow.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 5 | Result
1 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE 4h33'02
2 Andreas Klöden ASTANA + 25
3 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA s.t.
4 Michael Boogerd RABOBANK s.t.
5 Cadel Evans PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 1'05
6 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX s.t.
7 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
8 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
9 Jérôme Pineau BOUYGUES TELECOM + 1'36
10 Alexandre Botcharov CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
11 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA s.t.
12 Andrea Tonti QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC s.t.
13 Vladimir Efimkin CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
14 Juan Manuel Gárate QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC s.t. 15 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC + 2'04
16 Iban Mayo SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t.
17 Unai Etxebarria EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI s.t.
18 Anthony Charteau CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
19 Aitor Hernández G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI s.t.
20 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS s.t. 29 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 2'42
36 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 3'30
48 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC + 4'25
55 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 5'11
143 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 20'05
157 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 20'53
160 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 21'16
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 5 | GC
1 Andreas Klöden ASTANA 18h13'44
2 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA + 20
3 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 33
4 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 1'48
5 Cadel Evans PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 1'50
6 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM + 2'00
7 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 2'27
8 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA + 2'47
9 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 3'20
10 Denis Menchov RABOBANK + 3'41
11 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK + 4'05
12 Vincenzo Nibali LIQUIGAS + 4'24
13 Antonio Colom ASTANA + 5'02 14 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 5'13
15 David Cañada SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR + 5'16
16 Vladimir Efimkin CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 5'19
17 Yaroslav Popovych DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 5'48
18 Juan Manuel Gárate QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 5'54
19 Chris Horner PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 5'56
20 Amaël Moinard COFIDIS + 6'06 26 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC + 8'12
45 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 18'05
47 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 18'50
83 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC + 29'13
140 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 49'22
160 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 52'55
163 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 53'03
Inspite of two consecutive wins, Valverde hasn’t manage to shake race leader Klöden.
June 16:Tour de Suisse – Prologue | Olten – 3,8 km
Stage Profile:
Team: Carlos Sastre, Fabian Cancellara, Frank Schleck, Chris Anker Sørensen, Bobby Julich, Christian Vandevelde, Iñigo Cuesta and Alexandr Kolobnev.
I’ve been looking forward to this race for a while. Mainly because I’ve been away from the ProTour since the Giro ended, so I revel being back in the most prestigious class of cycling – and for good reason I reckon. We have a very, very interesting team with us in this race. The most interesting rider is maybe Carlos Sastre who will use this race to hone his fitness as he’ll be looking to take a podium spot in next month’s Tour de France. Also it’s special for Fabian, who hasn’t been that visible lately. Surely he would like to win both time trials here in the biggest race of his home country. Also Frank and Chris Anker will be very interesting to follow. Frank has been out of competition since Liege-Bastogne-Liege, and leading the ProTour he’ll need to gain a good result in the Tour de France. To do so he needs to increase his form during this race, but we don’t at all count on him for the GC. Chris Anker is a great climbing talent and he is in absolute topform coming into this race. I have the feeling he’ll be much better than Frank in the mountains. Bobby, Christian, Iñigo and Alex is here to show that they deserve to go to the Tour de France. As of now Christian is leading the others in that hunt after he rode fantastically in the mountains in the Giro.
Fabian was our first rider to take off and naturally he tore up the track beating provisional leader Thomas Lövkvist by 4 seconds. I hoped for more as he would have to beat José Ivan Gutierrez in order to win today and that could tricky, as the Spaniard is in really shape right now.
Thomas Løvkvist started out quick to take the lead but a shooting rainbow came by and knocked him off the first spot even quicker.
Our next rider on the course was Frank Schleck, who has been working intensely on his time trial abilities in this season. He’s not on form yet however and he only managed provisional 9th, but he would slip a lot longer down on the time sheet. Then it was time for today’s other big favourite, Gutierrez. He was fast, really fast.
Frank was pretty useless today, but José Ivan Gutierrez might just grab the lead could he keep his high starting pace.
And Gutierrez did beat Cancellara. Unfortuneately. Already at this point it was hard to see who could break the Top 2. Christian Vandevelde couldn’t. Actually he couldn’t even beat Schleck, so he was pretty poor today. Devolder would be a good bid but obviously he was also out of order as he couldn’t even break into the top 10. He barely managed top 20 actually and he would slip even longer down at the end of the day.
Vandevelde will have to do a lot better to earn a spot on the Tour de France team and Devolder aswell.
Ignatiev and Bodrogi took the stage a bit later and they did well. Both of them broke safely into the top ten where they would remain the rest of the time. Besides them there was now only one big contender left, Alexandre Vinokourov.
Eastern Europe was well-represent by Ignatiev and Bodrogi who displayed pretty good form on the prologue.
But before Vinokourov took off, Carlos Sastre would start his build-up to the Tour de France here in Olten. He’s been in wind tunnel practice with Frank before this tour and turned out to be a great investmen as Carlos really rode a tremendous time trial. The best of his career maybe. He finished the 3,8 kilometre route in provisional 7th best time. Then it was time for Vinokourov to also commence his Tour de France build-up. But surprisingly he wasn’t very strong today considering his regular abilities on a time trial. The Kazakh couldn’t even beat Sastre and he would end the day as the 12th best rider.
Carlos Sastre could be in for a great month as he really proved himself as a time trialist, Vinokourov on the other hand shows concerning form.
So Gutierrez ends up winner and will claim the leader’s jersey. Fabian was a bit dissapointed about his 2nd place, but there’s one time trial in this race left, for him to show his home fans that he’s the best. Considering Chris Anker’s time trial abilities he was also outstanding today and he could cause havoc in the mountains.
Tour de Suisse – Prologue | Result
1 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE 5'23
2 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 5
3 Thomas Lövkvist FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 10
4 Marcel Sieberg TEAM MILRAM + 11
5 Serhiy Matveyev CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE + 12
6 Marco Velo TEAM MILRAM s.t.
7 Laszlo Bodrogi CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
8 Mikhail Ignatiev TINKOFF CREDIT SYSTEMS + 13 9 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC s.t.
10 Markus Fothen GEROLSTEINER + 14
11 Pavel Brutt TINKOFF CREDIT SYSTEMS s.t.
12 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA s.t.
13 Haimar Zubeldia EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI + 15
14 Steven Cummings DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
15 Torsten Hiekmann GEROLSTEINER + 16
16 Mark Renshaw CREDIT AGRICOLE + 17
17 Brett Lancaster TEAM MILRAM s.t.
18 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI + 18 19 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC s.t.
20 Thomas Ziegler T-MOBILE TEAM + 19 27 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC + 21
29 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC s.t.
30 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC s.t.
32 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC + 22
63 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC + 32
Tour de Suisse – Prologue | GC
1 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE 5'23
2 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 5
3 Thomas Lövkvist FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 10
4 Marcel Sieberg TEAM MILRAM + 11
5 Serhiy Matveyev CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE + 12
6 Marco Velo TEAM MILRAM s.t.
7 Laszlo Bodrogi CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
8 Mikhail Ignatiev TINKOFF CREDIT SYSTEMS + 13 9 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC s.t.
10 Markus Fothen GEROLSTEINER + 14
June 16:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 6 | Gap > Valloire – 198 km
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 6 | Result
1 Sylvain Calzati AG2R PREVOYANCE 6h12'41
2 Matthew White DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
3 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 1'00
4 Denis Menchov RABOBANK + 1'42
5 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
6 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA + 1'57
7 Yaroslav Popovych DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 2'20
8 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA s.t.
9 Andreas Klöden ASTANA s.t.
10 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK s.t.
11 Cadel Evans PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 3'05
12 David López García CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
13 Chris Horner PREDICTOR - LOTTO s.t.
14 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 3'26
15 Tom Danielson DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
16 Juan Manuel Gárate QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 3'43
17 Stefan Schumacher GEROLSTEINER + 4'16
18 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX s.t. 19 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC s.t.
20 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM + 4'37 21 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 5'19
60 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 10'46
66 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 11'18
67 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC + 11'52
140 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 49'37
168 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC s.t.
174 Anders Lund TEAM CSC s.t.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 6 | GC
1 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE 24h27'54
2 Andreas Klöden ASTANA + 51
3 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA + 1'11
4 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 2'01
5 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA + 3'15
6 Cadel Evans PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 3'26
7 Denis Menchov RABOBANK + 3'54
8 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 4'24
9 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK + 4'56
10 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM + 5'08
11 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 6'07
12 Yaroslav Popovych DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 6'39
13 Chris Horner PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 7'32
14 Juan Manuel Gárate QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 8'08 15 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 9'03
16 Vincenzo Nibali LIQUIGAS + 9'58
17 David López García CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 10'25 18 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC + 10'59
19 Antonio Colom ASTANA + 11'16
20 Vladimir Efimkin CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 12'21 46 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 27'54
47 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 28'07
78 Stuart O'Grady TEAM CSC + 39'36
145 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 1h37'30
161 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 1h41'03
164 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 1h41'11
Gutierrez held off Cancellara as he won the prologue of Tour de Suisse to the dissapointment of the home crowd.
June 17:Tour de Suisse – Stage 1 | Olten > Luzern – 159 km
Stage Profile:
We’d hoped to be defending a yellow jersey today but with Cancellara 5 seconds off, it doesn’t seem like we’ll ever get that jersey in this race. Carlos is our best bid but he isn’t peak condition just yet, so we don’t expect him to challenge for the GC win eventhough this is a race that actually suits him quite perfectly. Today is more or less flat with a small hill near the end but we still expect this to end in a mass sprint, where we might see Fabian participating. Also there’s two intermediate sprints at the finish and if Fabian somehow can win them both, then he’ll grab the lead by 1 seconds and get one day as the GC leader, but we aren’t counting on that to happen though.
The TV break consisted of Vasseur, Valentin, Trussov, Cruz, Boven, Mondory, Kalesnikov and Dall’antonia.
The break had a maximum gap of 7 minutes with 100 kilometres to, but from here on Caisse upped the pace to defend Gutierrez jersey. With 40 km to go and 10 to the first of the last two intermediate sprints, the gap had been cut to just 55 seconds. Fabian took his opportunity and attacked from the pack in hope of catching the breakaway and winning the sprint, so he could gain 3 seconds on Gutierrez. He succeeded. Incredibly quick he caught the break just before the sprint began and at the line there were no challengers for Fabian. But he’d face a very big challenge now. The pack had caught the break just before the hill, which was quite steep with sections over 7 percent, and Fabian would need to stay at the front to be in contention for the sprint.
Fabian decided to take his chance as he challenged Gutierrez for the yellow jersey, he won the first sprint and now he had just one to go. Can he do it?
Fabian was beat. The hill turned out incredibly tough and he would drop very far back in the pack following his effort before the first sprint. Some riders attacked for mountain points but they wouldn’t get a decisive gap, so things would end in a mass sprint today just as we expected it. The intermediate sprint was at the bottom of the slope almost, but Fabian just couldn’t regain his position in the pack and so he would have to settle to be 3 seconds off Gutierrez.
After the descent a lot of the sprinters were far back in the peloton, so the final dash turned out to be quite chaotic, with no real trains leading out the sprinters. Igor Astarloa of Milram found himselves leading out the sprint. Unfortuneately for him it wasn’t Zabel who was in his wheel but Jean-Patrick Nazon and it seemed to be a great situation for the Frenchman who bursted into the lead as they hit the final stretch.
Jean-Patrick Nazon of AG2R was in a great position in the sprint. His hope was that none of the other sprinters were near him.
But suddenly Danilo Napolitano came shooting out of Nazon’s wheel. No one had seen him and he was definitely going to win today. Slowly other top sprinters began showing themselves, but none of them could catch Napolitano or Nazon.
Napolitano took a convincing win as he wasn’t really challenged by his fellow sprinter. It was his first win since he grabbed a stage in the Giro.
Leonardo Duque finished 3rd ahead of Thor Hushovd and Bernhard Eisel. Fabian had hoped to be in contention but he never found the front after the hill, so he had to settle for 60th on the stage. Matveyev was dropped today meaning Carlos Sastre moved to 8th in the GC before tomorrow’s mountain stage and looking at the riders ahead of him in the GC, we could see him take over the yellow jersey after tomorrow.
Tour de Suisse – Stage 1 | Result
1 Danilo Napolitano LAMPRE - FONDITAL 3h45'43
2 Jean-Patrick Nazon AG2R PREVOYANCE s.t.
3 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS s.t.
4 Thor Hushovd CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
5 Bernhard Eisel T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
6 Steven De Jongh QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC s.t.
7 Erik Zabel TEAM MILRAM s.t.
8 Aurélien Clerc BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
9 Fred Rodriguez PREDICTOR - LOTTO s.t.
10 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI s.t. 56 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC s.t.
57 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC s.t.
60 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC s.t.
65 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC s.t.
85 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
117 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC s.t.
119 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC s.t.
148 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC + 2'27
Tour de Suisse – Stage 1 | GC
1 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE 3h51'06
2 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 2
3 Thomas Lövkvist FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 10
4 Marcel Sieberg TEAM MILRAM + 11
5 Marco Velo TEAM MILRAM + 12
6 Laszlo Bodrogi CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
7 Mikhail Ignatiev TINKOFF CREDIT SYSTEMS + 13 8 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC s.t.
9 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA + 14
10 Pavel Brutt TINKOFF CREDIT SYSTEMS s.t.
11 Markus Fothen GEROLSTEINER s.t.
12 Steven Cummings DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 15
13 Haimar Zubeldia EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI s.t.
14 Brett Lancaster TEAM MILRAM + 17
15 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI + 18 16 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC s.t.
17 Thor Hushovd CREDIT AGRICOLE + 19
18 Laurent Lefèvre BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
19 Thomas Ziegler T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
20 Rubens Bertogliati SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t. 23 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC + 21
24 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC s.t.
27 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC s.t.
49 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC + 32
126 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC + 2'49
June 17:Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 7 | Valloire > Annecy – 129 km
Bad news. Voigt slipped out of the top 20 but what's worse is that Stuey crashed out of race and got injured. The doctor estimates him to be back in the start of next month, but alread he's very questionable for Le Tour, which is a big blow for us.
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 7 | Result
1 Yaroslav Popovych DISCOVERY CHANNEL 3h09'53
2 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS s.t.
3 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX s.t.
4 Michael Boogerd RABOBANK s.t.
5 David López García CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
6 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
7 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 38
8 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK s.t.
9 Andreas Klöden ASTANA s.t.
10 Vladimir Efimkin CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
11 Tom Danielson DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
12 Chris Horner PREDICTOR - LOTTO s.t.
13 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
14 Charles Wegelius LIQUIGAS s.t.
15 Laurent Brochard BOUYGUES TELECOM + 1'16
16 Patrice Halgand CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
17 Fabian Wegmann GEROLSTEINER s.t.
18 Stefan Schumacher GEROLSTEINER s.t.
19 Antonio Colom ASTANA s.t.
20 Anthony Charteau CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t. 48 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 1'44
80 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 2'46
99 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC + 3'07
131 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 3'36
138 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 3'59
160 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 4'24
173 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 5'41
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 7 | Final GC
1 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE 27h38'25
2 Andreas Klöden ASTANA + 51
3 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 1'23
4 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA + 1'49
5 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS + 3'40
6 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA + 4'21
7 Cadel Evans PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 4'32
8 Thomas Dekker RABOBANK + 4'56
9 Denis Menchov RABOBANK + 5'00
10 Patrik Sinkewitz T-MOBILE TEAM + 5'08
11 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 5'25
12 Yaroslav Popovych DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 5'51
13 Chris Horner PREDICTOR - LOTTO + 7'32
14 Juan Manuel Gárate QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 9'42
15 David López García CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 9'47 16 David Zabriskie TEAM CSC + 10'09
17 Vincenzo Nibali LIQUIGAS + 11'04
18 Michael Boogerd RABOBANK + 11'47
19 Antonio Colom ASTANA + 11'54
20 Vladimir Efimkin CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 12'21 22 Jens Voigt TEAM CSC + 13'28
47 Lars Ytting Bak TEAM CSC + 30'15
50 Volodimir Gustov TEAM CSC + 30'52
143 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 1h41'16
159 Martin Pedersen TEAM CSC + 1h44'24
169 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 1h46'14
Critérium du Daupiné Libéré – Stage 7 | Points Competition
1 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE 83
2 Andreas Klöden ASTANA 73
3 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA 58
4 Sylvain Chavanel COFIDIS 46
5 Levi Leipheimer DISCOVERY CHANNEL 41
6 Allan Davis DISCOVERY CHANNEL 40
7 Sandy Casar FRANÇAISE DES JEUX 36
8 Yaroslav Popovych DISCOVERY CHANNEL 34
9 Denis Menchov RABOBANK 34
10 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA 32
Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré – Stage 7 | King of the Mountains Competition
1 Denis Menchov RABOBANK 128
2 Paolo Savoldelli ASTANA 119
3 Christophe Rinero SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR 100
4 Alejandro Valverde CAISSE D'EPARGNE 93
5 Robert Retschke TEAM WIESENHOF FELT 87
6 Andrea Pagoto CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE 80
7 Roman Kreuziger LIQUIGAS 68
8 Andrey Kashechkin ASTANA 63
9 Benoit Vaugrenard FRANÇAISE DES JEUX 63
10 Nicolas Crosbie BOUYGUES TELECOM 51
Double succes for Caisse d’Epargne as Valverde wins the Dauphiné and books a place as the top favourite for Le Tour, while Gutierrez leads Tour de Suisse.
June 18:Tour de Suisse – Stage 2 | Brunnen > Nauders – 229 km
Stage Profile:
The first mountains are here and we could see the leaders jersey change hands today if Gutierrez cracks on the Flülapass. But with the form he’s in I don’t think he will. The stage will be decided on the last climb just before the finish where a punchy rider could make a succesful break to win the stage.
Two groups got away early today. The leading group consisted of 11 riders and it had a duo with Deignan and Verheyen chasing them all day.
The leading group were, Kozontchuck, Dean, Cummings, Sacchi, Aldape Chavez, Albasini, Del Nero, Khatuntsev, Mengin, Rodriquez and Burghardt. The only decent climber here is the Mexican Aldape Chavez, but seeing he’s the only climber in the break, I don’t give him much chance of winning this. The gap grew consistently until 100 kilometres were left to race. Here the gap was 9’15”, but the pack, led by Astana began pulling them in as they hit the prelude climb before Flülepass, the Wolfgangpass. The Wolfgangpass began with about 50 kilometres to the top of the Flüelapass, which is no more than about 13 kilometres. But the Wolfgangpass is not very demanding as it’s more up and down than up.
Astana had confidence in Vinokourov’s ability to consume performance-enhancing substances, while we concentrated on protecting Sastre over the Wolfgang and Flüelapass.
As the pack hit the Flüelapass with about 80 kilometres to go of the stage and about 13 kilometres to the top, we sent forth Frank Schleck and Chris Anker to put some pressure on the 80-man peloton. First up was Chris Anker and he made people fall off instantly by taking a very, very long relay up this steep climb. Actually he led from the bottom of the climb until there were 4 km to the top. That’s just about 9 kilometres, and that’s by a neo-pro. As Frank hit the front things started happening as no other than Alexandre Vinokourov attack with 4 kilometres to the top. No one could or wanted to follow, considering there were about 70 kilometres to go. But apparently that couldn’t stop the Kazakh.
Frank and Chris did a very good job for Sastre, cutting the peloton to just 50 riders.
Vino didn’t just want the mountain points, he wanted the whole package and he wasn’t afraid to dig deep eventhough there were 70 kilometres to go.
Vinokourov caught the breakaway which was down to 9 riders, on the descent and he was going so fast that he dropped them. On the descent aswell. At the bottom of the descent, with 50 kilometres to go, Vinokourov had 2 minutes on the pack, which had nearly caught the remaining breakaway riders. From here Vinokourov, surprisingly began losing ground to the pack as his gap was cut to just 55 seconds with about 30 kilometres to go.
Has Vinokourov over-estimated his drug connections or can he come up with something before the final climb?
Then suddenly Vinokourov turned the heat on and he began gaining time on the 50 riders chasing him. With ten kilometres to the finish, just before the Norbertshöhe climb, Vinokourov had almost one and a half minute on the pack. We’d ordered Schleck, Sørensen, Kolobnev and Sastre to the head of the pack, but somehow Sastre couldn’t get to the front, meaning he was way down when the climb commenced. Sørensen tried to follow Samuel Sánchez and José Cobo, who both attacked and he did manage to bridge up with them. A little later Sastre joined up with them, making it a quartet whose object was to close down Vino.
Sastre and Sørensen were strong today as they found themselves alongside Sánchez and Cobo in the group chasing Vinokourov.
But the Kazakh would not be caught as he had increased his gap even further. It was now up to 2 minutes. At the top of Norbertshöhe there is a small descent that leads to the finishing line and Vinokourov bursted down the slope and took a superhuman win. Chris Anker was very strong and he managed to edge Sánchez and Cobo to take a phenomenal 2nd on the stage. Sastre lost a few seconds on the three others after he to use too much energy from his attack. Stijn Devolder led a group of 9, including Gutierrez, to the finish, 2’37” after Vinokourov.
Vinokourov annihilates the peloton and leave the other favourites in his wake as he blasts into the lead of Tour de Suisse.
Eventhough we couldn’t keep up with Vinokourov this was a brilliant stage for us and especially for Chris Anker, who I didn’t thought could this well. He’s actually 3rd in the GC, while Sastre climbed from 8th to 5th. Frank Schleck is 14th, which is pretty good as I honestly didn’t thought he could muster up any Top 20 results with the kind of form he’s in. Also Chris Anker will now ride in the U/25 jersey and we have taken the lead in the teams classification and we’re determined to keep it. Tomorrow’s stage features a big mountain top finish at Triesenberg-Malbun and we hope to be up there again.
Tour de Suisse – Stage 2 | Result
1 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA 5h53'56
2 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC + 2'01
3 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI s.t.
4 Juan José Cobo Acebo SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t. 5 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC + 2'17
6 Stijn Devolder DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 2'37
7 Michael Rasmussen RABOBANK s.t.
8 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS s.t.
9 Luis León Sánchez CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
10 Christophe Moreau AG2R PREVOYANCE s.t.
11 Patxi Vila LAMPRE - FONDITAL s.t.
12 Sébastien Joly FRANÇAISE DES JEUX s.t.
13 Koldo Gil SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t.
14 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t. 15 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC + 2'56
16 Luca Mazzanti CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
17 Sergio Paulinho DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
18 Linus Gerdemann T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
19 Domenico Pozzovivo CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
20 Thomas Voeckler BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t. 38 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
64 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 7'56
69 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC + 8'04
82 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC + 10'04
83 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC s.t.
Tour de Suisse – Stage 2 | GC
1 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA 9h45'00
2 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI + 2'17 3 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC + 2'18
4 Juan José Cobo Acebo SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR + 2'22 5 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC + 2'32
6 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 2'39
7 Stijn Devolder DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 3'00
8 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS s.t.
9 Patxi Vila LAMPRE - FONDITAL + 3'03
10 Thomas Lövkvist FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 3'08
11 Haimar Zubeldia EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI + 3'13
12 Laurent Lefèvre BOUYGUES TELECOM + 3'17
13 Koldo Gil SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR + 3'18 14 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC + 3'19
15 Christophe Moreau AG2R PREVOYANCE s.t.
16 Saul Raisin CREDIT AGRICOLE + 3'21
17 Thomas Voeckler BOUYGUES TELECOM + 3'26
18 Matteo Carrara UNIBET.COM s.t.
19 Johann Tschopp BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
20 Sergio Paulinho DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 3'29 21 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC + 3'30
56 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 8'00
59 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC + 8'24
77 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC + 10'27
83 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC + 12'55
Tour de Suisse – Stage 2 | Points Competition
1 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA 38
2 Danilo Napolitano LAMPRE - FONDITAL 31
3 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS 30
4 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI 22
5 Jean-Patrick Nazon AG2R PREVOYANCE 20 6 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC 20
7 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC 18
8 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE 17 9 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC 15
10 Thor Hushovd CREDIT AGRICOLE 13
Tour de Suisse - Stage 2 | King of the Mountains
1 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA 25
2 Dimitry Kozontchuck RABOBANK 15
3 Michael Albasini LIQUIGAS 10
4 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS 7
5 Moises Aldape Chavez CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE 6
6 Steven Cummings DISCOVERY CHANNEL 4
7 Mikhail Ignatiev TINKOFF CREDIT SYSTEMS 3
8 Igor Astarloa TEAM MILRAM 3
9 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI 3
10 Thomas Voeckler BOUYGUES TELECOM 2
Vinokourov managed to beat 50 riders chasing him as he took over the leaders jersey in Tour de Suisse.
June 19:Tour de Suisse – Stage 3 | Tirol-Nauders > Triesenberg-Malbun – 167 km
Stage Profile:
Another day in Switzerland, another day of mountains. Yesterday we had a fantastic day on a not-so-tough mountain stage, but still we’re confident we can come up with something from the same drawer today. We occupy 3rd, 5th and 14th in the GC so we have plenty of riders to rely on. As of now I still think of Sastre as being our best rider for the GC here, mainly because of his great experience compared to Chris Anker’s.
Chris Anker took over the U/25 jersey yesterday and he could be in for his big breakthrough in this race, but he’ll not come close to the leader, Vinokourov.
Two groups got away. The leading trio consisted of Minard, Petito and Jegou while the trailing duo consisted of Astarloa and Greipel.
About midway through the stage the riders will cross the Arlbergpass and here Minardo decided to leave his breakaway companions in his wake. The two duos behind hook up and started chasing him, but they couldn’t gain on him on the climb, where he led by over minutes at the top with about 95 km to go. The pack controlled by Astana crossed some 9’30” minutes later.
Minard went to solo on the Arlbergpass in hope of staying clear the last 100 kilometres, but in order to do so he would need a stash of Vinokourov’s magnitude.
But it was never going to happed for Minard. There were 80 kilometres between the top of the Arlbergpass and the foot of Triesenberg-Malbun and Minard hit the wall before he commenced the ascension. He was caught by the quartet a few kilometre before the final climb and this group of 5 was caught almost instantly as they hit the climb. The finale is on.
Rasmussen was the first to act on Triesenberg-Malbun when he took off with Pozzovivo, Sánchez and Uran following him. Uran couldn’t group up with them and he ended between them and a large group which would be formed by later attackers. Among these were Sastre, Sørensen and Schleck. Schleck couldn’t make contact, but Sastre and Sørensen did. So the situation right now is, Sánchez, Pozzovivo and Rasmussen leading. Uran soloing behind them. Then a group counting Sastre, Sørensen, Gerdemann, Vila, Cobo, Løvkvist, Moreau, Devolder and Tschopp. No Vinokourov so far.
Rasmussen started off things on the last climb where he was countered by Pozzovivo, Sánchez and Uran, with the latter being able to keep up.
In the leading trio, Sánchez is the best in the GC (2nd, 2’17”) and if Vinokourov doesn’t make a move soon he will lose his jersey. With 7 kilometres to go Vino made his move from the pack. But he only fought his way up to the Sastre-Group, who were losing time on the leaders. With about 4 kilometres to the finish the leading group had 1’33” on the Vinokorouv group and they were still gaining. Carlos and Chris weren’t feeling very strong today and they began hurting a lot at this point.
The Vinokourov-Group didn’t look able to catch the leaders as Sánchez was closing in on the yellow jersey. Sastre and Sørensen were having problems.
With 3 kilometres to Sørensen had to let go. He’d hit the wall, but fortuneately he wasn’t dropped immediately. About a half kilometre later Sastre also hit the wall and from this point they both lost contact with the group and they fought alongside to minimize the loss, but it was already huge at this point. Sánchez was getting closer and closer to the jersey as he only needed about 10 seconds.
Sastre and Sørensen could lose their top ten spots as they both had an awful day, Sánchez on the other hand was motoring up the slopes.
Sastre and Sørensen were caught by the pack just before the flame rouge, so they would lose lots of time today and they’d most likely drop out of the top ten unfortuneately. The leaders were now on the final stretch with Sánchez opening the sprint. You would think he would claim this one uncontested, but Rasmussen looked to overtake him at one point. He came close but it wasn’t going to happen after all. Sánchez took the stage ahead of Rasmussen and Pozzovivo. Uran came in 1’50” after Sánchez.
Samuel Sánchez showed his class as he won on Triesenberg-Malbun and challenged Vinokourov for his yellow jersey.
Vinokourov would have to some in before 2’07” to retain his jersey. He led a group of 7 up the final part and he looked set to just make the cut. But he didn’t! He came in 2’07” after Sánchez, meaning he would be in the same time in the GC, but he would lose the jersey because Sánchez came in before him today. The 6 other riders in Vino’s group were Gerdemann, Devolder, Vila, Moreau, Cobo and Tschopp. All of them would move past Sastre and Sørensen in the GC as those two came in with the pack, 4’06” after Sánchez. Very bad day for us as they both slip out of the Top 10.
Tour de Suisse – Stage 3 | Result
1 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI 4h27'57
2 Michael Rasmussen RABOBANK s.t.
3 Domenico Pozzovivo CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE s.t.
4 Rigoberto Uran UNIBET.COM + 1'50
5 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA + 2'07
6 Linus Gerdemann T-MOBILE TEAM s.t.
7 Patxi Vila LAMPRE - FONDITAL s.t.
8 Juan José Cobo Acebo SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR s.t.
9 Christophe Moreau AG2R PREVOYANCE s.t.
10 Stijn Devolder DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
11 Johann Tschopp BOUYGUES TELECOM s.t.
12 Thomas Lövkvist FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 3'14
13 Koldo Gil SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR + 4'06
14 Addy Engels QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC s.t.
15 Marco Fertonani CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
16 Haimar Zubeldia EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI s.t.
17 Luis León Sánchez CAISSE D'EPARGNE s.t.
18 Sergio Paulinho DISCOVERY CHANNEL s.t.
19 Christophe Le Mével CREDIT AGRICOLE s.t.
20 Sébastien Joly FRANÇAISE DES JEUX s.t. 22 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC s.t.
25 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC s.t.
30 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC s.t.
35 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC s.t.
37 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC s.t.
65 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC + 6'37
104 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC + 9'25
108 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 9'57
Tour de Suisse – Stage 3 | GC
1 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI 14h15'04
2 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA s.t.
3 Michael Rasmussen RABOBANK + 1'34
4 Domenico Pozzovivo CERAMICA PANARIA - NAVIGARE + 1'41
5 Juan José Cobo Acebo SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR + 2'22
6 Stijn Devolder DISCOVERY CHANNEL + 3'00
7 Patxi Vila LAMPRE - FONDITAL + 3'03
8 Christophe Moreau AG2R PREVOYANCE + 3'19
9 Johann Tschopp BOUYGUES TELECOM + 3'26
10 Linus Gerdemann T-MOBILE TEAM + 3'41
11 Rigoberto Uran UNIBET.COM + 3'42
12 Thomas Lövkvist FRANÇAISE DES JEUX + 4'15 13 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC + 4'17
14 Carlos Sastre TEAM CSC + 4'31
15 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE + 4'38
16 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS + 4'59
17 Haimar Zubeldia EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI + 5'12
18 Laurent Lefèvre BOUYGUES TELECOM + 5'16
19 Koldo Gil SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR + 5'17 20 Frank Schleck TEAM CSC + 5'18
25 Alexandr Kolobnev TEAM CSC + 5'29
69 Iñigo Cuesta TEAM CSC + 14'54
70 Christian Vandevelde TEAM CSC + 14'57
75 Bobby Julich TEAM CSC + 15'42
76 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC + 15'50
Tour de Suisse – Stage 3 | Points Competition
1 Alexandre Vinokourov ASTANA 46
2 Samuel Sánchez G. EUSKALTEL - EUSKADI 37
3 Danilo Napolitano LAMPRE - FONDITAL 31
4 Leonardo Duque COFIDIS 30
5 Michael Rasmussen RABOBANK 21
6 Jean-Patrick Nazon AG2R PREVOYANCE 20 7 Chris Anker Sørensen TEAM CSC 20
8 Juan José Cobo Acebo SAUNIER DUVAL - PRODIR 18 9 Fabian Cancellara TEAM CSC 18
10 José Iván Gutierrez CAISSE D'EPARGNE 17
Samuel Sánchez takes over the yellow – but not by much.
June 19:Ster Elektrotoer – Prologue | Schijndel – 7,8 km
Meanwhile he have a team in Holland for this minor stage race. We hope that Matti can do something in the GC here, as he will have lot to prov if he is to earn a spot on the Tour team. But to be honest it’s highly likely that he’ll get his Grand Tour debut in La Vuelta later this year, but he is the only rider here who has a little chance of making it to the Tour team, so he’ll have to do good now where he must be 100% over his injury.
Ster Elektrotoer – Prologue | Result
1 Sébastien Rosseler QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC 14'00
2 Joost Posthuma RABOBANK + 6
3 Rick Flens RABOBANK + 12
4 Benoit Joachim ASTANA + 18
5 Koen De Kort ASTANA + 19
6 Marc De Maar RABOBANK + 24 7 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC + 28
8 Gerben Löwik RABOBANK + 29
9 Maarten Tjallingii SKIL - SHIMANO + 33
10 David Boucher LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER + 40 11 Matti Breschel TEAM CSC + 41
12 Michael Blaudzun TEAM CSC + 42
13 Giovanni Visconti QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 44
14 Markus Eichler UNIBET.COM + 47
15 Jens Mouris DFL Cyclingnews.com + 50
16 Andy Cappelle LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER + 52
17 Filip Meirhaeghe LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER + 54
18 Carlos Barredo L. QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 56
19 Stijn Vandenbergh UNIBET.COM + 58
20 Tom Boonen QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC + 1'01 44 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 1'53
45 Kasper Klostergaard TEAM CSC + 1'55
58 Lars Michaelsen TEAM CSC + 2'27
66 Juan José Haedo TEAM CSC + 2'43
81 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 3'24
Ster Elektrotoer – Prologue | GC
1 Sébastien Rosseler QUICKSTEP - INNERGETIC 14'00
2 Joost Posthuma RABOBANK + 6
3 Rick Flens RABOBANK + 12
4 Benoit Joachim ASTANA + 18
5 Koen De Kort ASTANA + 19
6 Marc De Maar RABOBANK + 24 7 Marcus Ljungqvist TEAM CSC + 28
8 Gerben Löwik RABOBANK + 29
9 Maarten Tjallingii SKIL - SHIMANO + 33
10 David Boucher LANDBOUWKREDIET - TONISSTEINER + 40 11 Matti Breschel TEAM CSC + 41
12 Michael Blaudzun TEAM CSC + 42
44 Anders Lund TEAM CSC + 1'53
45 Kasper Klostergaard TEAM CSC + 1'55
58 Lars Michaelsen TEAM CSC + 2'27
66 Juan José Haedo TEAM CSC + 2'43
81 Allan Johansen TEAM CSC + 3'24
