After my first PCM story last year with Milram, I thought I'd start one for PCM 2011 with my first ever custom team, Team Powerbar-Brandt. This is a Belgian-registered team sponsored by an American maker of energy bars and a French brandname producing various home equipment.
As it is a Belgian team we will be focusing mostly on the classics, but nevertheless we are quite an all-round team with riders capable of winning overall GC in stage races too.
Leaders Philippe Gilbert Nicolas Roche Sylvain Chavanel
Protected riders Kim Kirchen Greg Van Avermaet Jan Bakelands Jeremy Roy
Mountain Domestiques Thiago Machado Bart De Clerq
Sprinters Ben Swift Mark Renshaw
Time Trialists/Domestiques David Zabriskie Maarten Tjallingi Lieuwe Westra Cameron Meyer Dominique Cornu
General Domestiques Alexandre Pliuschin Gianni Meersman Staf Scheirlinckx Matthew Hayman Marc De Maar
The first race up - the Australian national championships! Can Matthew Hayman, Mark Renshaw or Cameron Meyer become the first wearers of a national champions jersey at Team Powerbar-Brandt?Edited by hotchip95 on 06-08-2011 11:08
Above you can see the new Team Powerbar-Brandt kit for the first time! (It's my first ever go at jersey design so be nice )
Just 3km into the 160km hilly course the first few riders began to attack, including former champion Robbie McEwen to was trying to reclaim his crown. After opening up a slight gap over the bunch, three further riders tried to bridge across to the leaders including Team Powerbar-Brand's Matthew Hayman.
They made it across and four became seven out in front:
Inside 70km to go the seven leaders had over a 7 minute lead, and it became quickly clear that they would hold on for the win - but who would take it?
With 20km to go, Hayman attacked on the penultimate climb of the day and opened up a very slight lead, before using the descent to open up a lead of around 50 seconds. However, on the final climb he slowed to a snail's pace, and seemed like he would be caught.
However, thankfully he held on...just! Robbie McEwen battled through to second, with Team Powerbar-Brandt's other two riders Mark Renshaw and Cameron Meyer finishing inside the peloton around three minutes back.
A great start for the team and Matthew Hayman, who will be wearing the green and gold stripes at his next race!
A couple of days later came the ITT championships, with Team Powerbar-Brandt's Cameron Meyer being a major favourite for the title. Matthew Hayman is also riding, with Mark Renshaw sitting this one out.
Cameron Meyer completed the 38km course in 55' 31", the fastest of anyone before Richie Porte and then Cadel Evans bettered the time, with Evans taking the title.
Nevertheless, a podium place for Meyer and a terrific few days in Australia!
We're bringing a strong team to the Tour de San Luis:
Jan Bakelandts David Zabriskie Jeremy Roy Marc de Maar Matthew Hayman Gianni Meersman Dominique Cornu Bart de Clerq
We don't have one single leader, with many riders capable of taking the overall GC given that there is a TT in the middle of the race. However, Jan Bakelandts is the most likely to win of those selected.
Stage 1
Stage 1 was a quiet day for Team Powerbar-Brandt given that it was a flat day and we hadn't brought any sprinters to the race. Nevertheless, national champion of Curacao Marc de Maar was able to collect the only mountain classification of the day and so will wear that jersey tomorrow:
Oscar Gatto of Farnese Vini won the stage, with everyone from Team Powerbar-Brandt finishing safely inside the bunch. Here's the GC after stage 1:
Stage 1 may have been quiet, but stage 2 really wasn't, with Team Powerbar-Brandt taking their second win of the season, courtesy of Jan Bakelandts, who accelerated away from the peloton on the steep climb up to the finish, and took the race lead in the process. He finished in a group with Bert De Waele, who almost won the stage.
Gianni Meersmann finished the stage in 5th and moved up to that position in the GC. What's more, Marc de Maar took both mountain classification points on the stage and therefore keeps the polka dot jersey by two points over Bakelandts. Here's the GC:
Stage 3 was a very flat sprint day, with not even a mountain classification to chase for Marc de Maar. It was a day for Team Powerbar-Brandt to sit on the front of the peloton and make sure no breakaways got too much time.
Marcel Kittel from Skil-Shimano won the bunch sprint. Here's the GC following stage 3:
Stage 4 was a 17km individual time trial under blazing heat, and with Dave Zabriskie and Dominique Cornu racing for Team Powerbar-Brandt at this race, we were hoping for a stage win as well as retaining the yellow jersey.
It was a disappointing day for us though, as we failed to win the stage and lost the overall lead after a poor TT from Jan Bakelandts. Jeremy Roy was the surprise of the stage, finishing 4th, with Cornu 7th and Zabriskie 8th. Here's the GC:
Two things:
Machado isn't he potruguese? You put the flag of Mexico next too him.
Marc de Maar is from Curacao now. The Netherlands Antilles doesn't exist anymore.
MrDemus wrote:
Two things:
Machado isn't he potruguese? You put the flag of Mexico next too him.
Marc de Maar is from Curacao now. The Netherlands Antilles doesn't exist anymore.
dienblad wrote:
Looks great, jersey and short race journals. Keep it up!
Thanks!
Tour de San Luis...continued
Stage 5
Stage 5 was a flat stage until a final nasty hill up to the finish. It is pretty much the same stage which Jan Bakelandts won to first take the leaders jersey earlier in the tour. Could he do it again today and swap his white jersey for a yellow one?
The early break consisted of 18 riders including Team Powerbar-Brandt's Dominique Cornu. Sadly, Landbouwkrediet thought it was too dangerous to let go, and therefore brought it back in early on.
Three riders escaped later on in the day including Geox's Xavier Florencio, but none of them were any danger to taking the overall lead.
With 4km to go the first real GC contender attacked on the climb - 3rd place Rinaldo Nocentini of AG2R. Sadly, Jan Bakelands was terribly placed on the narrow roads and couldn't respond - it was all up to Jeremy Roy.
Nocentini and race leader De Waele rode away from Roy together along with Florencio, but inside the last couple of km Nocentini dropped the two others, and won the stage. Roy finished 4th and moved up to that position overall on GC. Bakelands fell to 7th.
While it's disappointing that we have now likely lost any hope of winning the Tour, we can take heart from the fact that we have half of our team inside the top 10!
)
what difficulty?
