Doing two laps on a 112km course makes up the 224km race of the Luxembourgian Road Race Championships in 2010. With only 10 teams registered, there's a small peloton of just 23 men going to race for the title. The favourites are, unsuprizingly, the Schleck brothers and Kirchen. Only Frank Schleck has got a few (4) teammates with him though, which should give him the edge. But on to the race.
This is it - the peloton for a 224km race...
With Accumalux leading the pack, Joachim is the first to attack after 10km.
Stoltz and Cardoni join him, and together they prepare for a full day up front, in a rather nice environment, but with a though climb. (20% at some point). Accumalux leads the pack, still.
Halfway, still Accumalux in the lead, with Schleck well protected. The gap is almost 9 minutes though, and with a pack of only 20 men, that seems a rather big gap...
The gap goes up to 10 minutes... 11...12... and even 13 minutes with 80km left! The three men up front might just be the podium three?
When the gap peaks at 16 minutes with 50km left, it becomes clear. The three men up front will battle it out. In the pack now though, in the decent of a small hill, Frank Schleck and teammate Clesen get a small gap. Maybe they're launching an ultimate counter attack attempt?
After they've taken a minute, A. Schleck and Kirchen have had enough and jump. Poos sits on their wheel.
As They catch up with Clesen, Schleck is already solo. But with 40km left, and a 14 minute gap, this will come too late.
The battle up front; with 25km left, Cordoni is dropped. Stoltz vs. Joachim for the title now!
3km, the finish is in sight and Joachim has a gap of a few meters.
The final kilometer, and the sprint is on as Stoltz gives it every bit of energy he has left!
Getting closer...
But Joachim holds him off and takes the Luxemburgian jersey!
As Cardoni takes third, F. Schleck comes in solo, 5 minutes later taking 4th. Another 2 minutes later, Kirchen and A Schleck both come in solo as well, taking 5th and 6th.
The Time Trial. You know the course by now, 47km. Favourites are Kirchen, Clesen and A. Schleck. But as we've already seen in a lot of National Championships, some riders may always suprize.
With Clesen as 'early' started, he sets a benchmark at all checkpoints.
But as Andy Schleck then comes, he does 6 seconds off at check one, another 3 at check two only to blow himself up in the third part; finishing 1 second behind on Clesen!
Next up is his brother Frank. He is definatly not as good as Andy when it comes to a TT though. He finishes a good 50 seconds slower.
Then comes the favourite though; Jack Wolfskin's Kim Kirchen. He storms through the checkpoints 17 and 41 seconds faster then Andy, to end up with an advantage of 44 seconds over Clesen at the line. Kim Kirchen takes the Time Trial jersey!
