Road Racing

Toyota-United made it two NRC victories in a row during a big weekend of racing in the Southeast, by taking the win at Sunday’s Nalley Historic Roswell Criterium just outside of metro Atlanta. Caleb Manion benefited from the same race situation that delivered teammate Hilton Clarke to the line first during the Sunny King Criterium on the previous day in Anniston, Alabama. In Anniston, Manion figured in the winning breakaway, and in Roswell he was also one of four riders that left the 70-man field behind.

Team Tecos-Trek's Colombian climber, Gregorio Ladino Vega, used the Tour of the Gila's mountainous final stage on Sunday to regain the race lead he lost in the stage 3 time trial. [nid:75825]Bissell's Burke Swindlehurst, a three-time winner of the Gila overall, won the final stage and vaulted from sixth to second. Bissell's Tom Zirbel started the day in the pink leader's jersey, and stayed with the lead group over the first major climb, but crashed on the descent and abandoned the race. His team said Zirbel broke his collarbone, some ribs and a finger.

It could have been 2006 at the Mountain Bike World Cup in Madrid, with Julien Absalon (Orbea) and Gunn-Rita Dahle Flesjå (Multivan Merida) winning this third round of the series. For Absalon, it was business as usual, as he took his third straight victory. However, for Dahle Flesjå it was an emotional moment as she completed her journey back to the forefront of the field after a year of illness. Absalon cemented his lead in the men's overall standings, while Marie-Helene Premont (Rocky Mountain) donned the leader's jersey for the women, the third leader in three races.

Daniele Bennati (Liquigas) won the fifth and final stage of the Tour de Romandie as Astana’s Andreas Klöden took the overall title. Bennati proved fastest of the bunch after it swept up a late break by Nick Nuyens (Cofidis), who took off with 10km to race and was reeled in 5km from the finish of the 152.4km stage from Le Bouveret to Lausanne. Markus Zberg (Gerolsteiner) and Maxim Iglinsky (Astana) took second and third on the day while Klöden crossed with the bunch to secure the overall win ahead of Roman Kreuzger (Liquigas) and Marco Pinotti (Team High Road).

The Italian sports newspaper, Gazzetta dello Sport reported on Saturday that Giro d'Italia organizers may be ready to do an about-face and invite the Astana team to this year’s race. At least one team official has confirmed that the invitation has already been extended. The team issued a statement on Sunday, confirming the invitation and that it will bring its three top riders to the event: Alberto Contador, Levi Leipheimer and the winner of the Tour of Romandie, Andreas Klöden. Astana general manager Johan Bruyneel gladly accepted the invitation.

The last turn of the Tour of the Gila's criterium is key for daredevil sprinters with the nerve to attack into the narrow left-hander and charge to the finish less than 300 meters away. The riders enter the turn at top speed thanks to a wide-open descent, and a mistake means high-siding it into a raised Old Western-style sidewalk on the outside of the turn. On Saturday, to the glee of the spectators who assemble on the sidewalk, the men's and women's winner each attacked coming into the turn and held their advantage to the line.

Francesco De Bonis (Gerolsteiner) pulled off a gutsy victory in the mountainous stage 4 of the Tour de Romandie, answering late charges by Manuel Beltran (Liquigas) and John Gadret (Ag2r-La Mondiale) to cross the line first in Zinal after having spent most of the day out front. Andreas Klöden (Astana) retained the overall lead by 35 seconds over Roman Kreuziger (Cze), Liquigas with Marco Pinotti (Team High Road) third at 0:43.

On another blustery day in southwestern New Mexico, Bissell's big men Tom Zirbel and Ben Jacques-Maynes hammered on the GC contenders to take the first two spots in the 16.4-mile Tyrone time trial. Zirbel turned a 34:26, beating his teammate by about 17 second and third place rider Chris Wherry (Toyota-United) by 49 seconds.

Andreas Klöden (Astana) won the stage 3 individual time trial and seized the overall lead of the Tour de Romandie on Friday. The 18.8km course included a dozen flat kilometers, a 266-meter climb with a pitch of 12 percent, and a rapid descent to the Place de la Planta with a twisting, turning final 500 meters that almost proved the Astana man’s undoing — Klöden clipped a barrier in the finale, but kept it upright to win the stage in 25 minutes and 32 seconds.

Tyler Wren (Colavita-Sutter Home) won Thursday's second stage of the Tour of the Gila with a final kilometer solo attack, while overall leader Gregorio Ladino Vega's Team Tecos-Trek put on another powerful show, setting a blistering pace over 80 miles of wind and hills. The Tecos effort kept a small breakaway within two minutes of the pack for most of the stage. It also forced a number of abandons throughout the day.

Karsten Kroon (Team CSC) won the 48th Rund um den Henninger Turm for the second time on Thursday. The 32-year-old Dutchman took the 179km race by outsprinting a nine-rider lead group that included Italian Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner) and Columbian Mauricio Ardila (Rabobank). "I had a strong spring, unfortunately without success," said Kroon, who first won here in 2004. "But today I felt very good. Andy Schleck has worked great for me."

Robbie McEwen (Silence-Lotto) sprang from a mad dash to the line to win stage 2 of the Tour de Romandie on Thursday. The Aussie speedster free-lanced his way to the front in a chaotic bunch sprint and shot off Milram rider Björn Schröder’s wheel to claim his first victory of 2008 ahead of Daniele Bennati (Lampre) and Matti Breschel (CSC). Michael Albasini (Liquigas) retained the overall lead.

Ryder Hesjedal is making the most of his new opportunity to race against the best in Europe. Following the collapse of the Phonak team in 2006, Hesjedal raced on the North American circuit last season before signing with Slipstream-Chipotle to return to Europe this year. The Canadian ex-mountain biker has quietly been posting some of Slipstream-Chipotle’s best results this spring, capped by a top-10 at Tirreno-Adriatico.

Sampson Sports has put together some of its existing and new products to create a time trial bike package that it says will allow riders to affordably assemble a sub-16-pound aero bike. The package includes Sampson's new Stratics time trial bars with Sampson's stem, brake levers, brakes, cranks, bottom bracket, pedals, saddle, and front and rear derailleur. The package includes Shimano Dura-Ace shifters and cassette. Sampson Sports' Eric Sampson said combining the package with a 1700-gram frame and 2100-gram wheels will produce a 15.5-pound bike.

Team Tecos-Trek continued its domination of Southwestern road cycling Wednesday by taking two of the top three spots on the first stage of the Tour of the Gila, a 94.1-mile stage that ended with a brutal climb to Mogollon, New Mexico. Colombian Gregorio Ladino Vega won the stage after gliding away from a select group at the base of the climb. He quickly gapped the group, which included Toyota-United's Chris Baldwin and Heath Blackgrove and built up a gap of about a half minute by the top of the 2,100-foot climb. Baldwin finished sixth.

Michael Albasini (Liquigas) seized the lead of the Tour de Romandie on Wednesday as Maxim Iglinsky (Astana) won stage 1, a 182km grind from Morges to Saignelégier. The Liquigas man, third in Tuesday's prologue and second today ahead of Markus Zberg (Gerolsteiner), proved fastest of an elite group that chased down a late breakaway by Alexandre Botcharov (Crédit Agricole), Mikel Astarloza (Euskaltel-Euskadi) and Jussi Veikkanen (Française des Jeux) on the descent from the category-1 climb to Saulcy.

Ritchey is all about white for the new season. The California company showed a new "Wet White" WCS alloy road handlebar at Sea Otter. It's already in use by the brand’s star domestic road team, Health Net–Maxxis and by the Tibco women's team. The company also is making a matching Wet White WCS 4-Axis alloy stem.

In last week’s column, I mentioned suspension as a likely Next Big Thing in road bikes. I also promised another prediction this week. This one I think is coming, but it’s going to take awhile.

Mark Cavendish continued High Road's winning streak by claiming the kickoff to the Tour de Romandie on Tuesday. The Brit won the 1.9km prologue in 2:07:60 ahead of Daniele Bennati (Liquigas), who was given the same time. Michael Albasini (Liquigas) rounded out the podium at one second back.

Final Overall 1. Kanstantsin Siutsou (Blr), Team High Road, 22.44'44" 2. Trent Lowe* (Aus), Slipstream-Chipotle, 0:04 3. Levi Leipheimer (USA), Astana, 0:14 4. Antonio Colom (Sp), Astana, 1:02 5. Inigo Cuesta (Sp), CSC, 1:11 6. Oscar Sevilla (Sp), Rock Racing, 1:25 7. Christian Vande Velde (USA), Slipstream-Chipotle, 1:32 8. Moises Aldape (MEX), TT1, 1:37 9. Rory Sutherland (Aus), Health Net Maxxis, 2:08 10. Bobby Julich (USA), CSC, 2:31 11. Rubiera Vigil José Luis (Sp), Astana, 2:39 12. Scott Nydam (USA), BMC, 2:49 13. George Hincapie (USA), Team High Road, 3:19

In probably the most dominant team showing since the revival of La Vuelta de Bisbee, Team Tecos from Mexico swept the top four spots in the final stage to push Colombian Gregorio Vega to a wire-to-wire victory. Vega donned the yellow jersey following Friday’s prologue and wore it all weekend, beating teammates Fausto Muñoz, Carlos Guinez and Francisco Navarro, who finished second through fourth in the overall.

This year’s Sea Otter was better than ever with regards to new product roll-outs. There was too much to see during the short four days I was in Monterey, but we caught the vast majority in the hottest new stuff category. I’ll cover the rest of the best in this final photo gallery, but look for a few more stories from the Otter that go deeper than these galleries have. You should expect a rundown of Shimano’s new Saint group online tis week, while reports on Tomac, Yeti and FSA will pop up in future pages of VeloNews and VeloNews.com.

The 2008 Tour de Georgia couldn’t have ended better for Team High Road on Sunday, as Kiwi sprinter Greg Henderson won the final stage and Belarusian Kanstantin Sivtsov secured his overall race lead by four seconds ahead of Slipstream-Chipotle’s Trent Lowe.

A new climb with 20km to go lived up to expectations, breaking Liège-Bastogne-Liège wide open, but Alejandro Valverde relied on tactical savvy and his fiery finish-line punch to win La Doyenne for the second time in three years Sunday. After working into the decisive four-man move, Spain’s “Green Bullet” collaborated with Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner) to fend off searing attacks from the Schleck brothers on the Saint-Nicolas climb with 5.5km to go only to relegate the Italian to bridesmaid status with his winning sprint.

Gregorio Vega (Team Tecos) won his second consecutive stage of La Vuelta de Bisbee on Saturday morning, then finished eighth in the afternoon’s time trial to hold a 21-second lead going into Sunday’s final stage, the Tombstone Road Race. In women’s racing, Marisa Russell (Procon-FNBA) won the Sulphur Springs Road Race and Kelly McDonald (Touchstone Climbing) the Warren Time Trial; McDonald took the yellow jersey from Chloe Forsman (Luna).

Despite a recently diagnosed injury that has kept him in near-constant pain, Rock Racing’s Rahsaan Bahati roared across the line at the Athens Twilight Criterium to capture his first major victory of the 2008 season. In a race that featured a relentless pace throughout in front of thousands in downtown Athens, Georgia, Bahati was able to beat a charging field to the line with enough time to lift his arms to the sky in tribute to a fallen friend.

Kanstantin Sivtsov (High Road) attacked Levi Leipheimer (Astana) and race leader Trent Lowe (Slipstream-Chipotle) in the final 500 meters to win the sixth stage of the Tour de Georgia and move into the overall lead on Saturday. Sivtsov, the under-23 world champion in 2005, started the day six seconds down on Lowe in eighth place, but well off most people’s radars.

If Friday’s prologue time trial is any indicator of what the weekend has in store, La Vuelta de Bisbee will come down to Team Tecos vs. the rest of the field. Tecos riders posted seven of the top 10 times in the 2.8-mile hill climb, which began on Main Street in Old Bisbee and ascended through Tombstone Canyon to the top of the Mule Pass Tunnel. The Guadalajara-based team brought nine riders to the 30th installment of the three-day race.

Acqua e Sapone's Stefano Garzelli won his second stage of the Trentino stage race in Italy on Friday, a mountainous 178.6km stage from Lavarone to Pejo Fonti. Liquigas' Vincenzo Nibali took the overall win in the four-day stage race; Garzelli finished second overall. Nibali took the overall lead after winning Thursday's stage from Torri del Benaco to Folgaria.

After sitting behind a ProTour engine over 133 hilly miles, Bissell’s Richard England timed his sprint right to take stage 5 of the 2008 Tour de Georgia on Friday. Slipstream-Chipotle’s Trent Lowe finished in the select front group of 22 riders to take the yellow jersey from High Road’s Greg Henderson, who had a hard day and came off the group on the second KOM climb.

Kona Bicycle has a new line of gloves with models for mountain biker, freeriders, roadies and kids. The men’s Chevron glove ($25) is intended for cross-country. It features a Chamude palm for increased durability, silicone grip finger tips for better braking control and a terry snot wipe thumb. The women’s XC glove offers an air-mesh palm with Chamude overlays for added durability and circulation, 4mm gel palm pad and gripped finger tips.

Stage 4's team time trial featured a short, hilly, twisty course. Although race officials banned the use of time trial bikes, disc wheels and aero helmets, equipment choice was still a factor. The teams used their standard road bikes, though many used the deepest-section wheels in their inventory. Race winner Slipstream-Chipotle pushed the limits the furthest, using deep section Zipp wheels and even trying to sneak aero helmet covers past the commissaires.

Starting the day one man down after Timmy Duggan’s frightful crash on Wednesday, an inspired Slipstream-Chipotle won the Tour de Georgia’s stage 4 team time trial Thursday at the Road Atlanta automotive raceway. Slipstream rode four laps of Road Atlanta’s rolling 2.5-mile racetrack in 19:36, 3.41 seconds faster than Astana, at an average speed of 29.14 miles per hour.

Fairwheel Bikes makes colored hoods for recent Campagnolo and Shimano's Dura-Ace, Ultegra and 105 shift/brake levers. Hoods for SRAM levers will be available later this year. The company says the hoods are exact replacements and are available in six colors. Suggested retail is $25.

Highroad’s Greg Henderson went pretty quick to win Wednesday’s stage 3 sprint — 81.3 kph to be exact; that’s more than 50 mph. We were able to take a look at the maximum values on Hendy’s SRM after the stage. Assuming he was putting out his hardest effort of the race in the final sprint it took 1250 watts to win.

J.J. Haedo isn’t the only rider toughing it out at this year’s Tour of Georgia. Team Type 1’s Matt Wilson, too, has a broken wrist and is racing in a soft cast. While pain isn’t too much of a problem, the cast on his right hand and wrist doesn’t allow him enough freedom of movement to easily operate his right Double Tap shifter.

After two slight misfires, High Road’s heavy artillery got its coordinates dialed Wednesday, firing Greg Henderson into the yellow jersey with an explosive win on stage 3 of the Tour de Georgia. Toyota-United’s Ivan Dominguez, winner of stage 1, lost the leader’s jersey when he came off the group in the hilly closing circuits of Gainesville.

Stefano Garzelli (Acqua e Sapone) won stage 2 of the Giro del Trentino on Wednesday. The Italian took the 178km leg from Torbole to Torri del Benaco ahead of compatriots Mauro Finetto (CSF) and Riccardo Chiarini (LPR). Jure Colcer (LPR) took the leader’s jersey from Volodymyr Zagorodny (NGC Medical-OTC Industrial), the winner of Tuesday’s opening time trial, a 9.7km race against the clock from Arco to Riva del Garda.

Dutch phenom Marianne Vos outgunned her challengers on the painfully steep slopes of the Mur de Huy to take a repeat win at the Flèche Wallonne women’s World Cup. Vos scaled the brutal kilometer-long pitch the fastest, dropping Marta Bastionelli (Italian National), Judith Arndt (High Road) and three-time winner Nicole Cooke (Great Britain) near the summit to take the fourth World Cup round of 2008. The victory was reminiscent of her 2007 victory, which saw Vos ride a tiring Cooke up the 25 percent pitch, then sprint to victory in the closing meters.

Sea Otter is over, but this year’s expo was bigger than ever and the overflow of what we saw there can and will go on for the rest of the week. In this edition we’ll look at brakes from Magura, Ridley frames, Rotor cranks and accessories from Lezyne.

SRAM trickles down its technologies rather quickly. It was two years ago that the company launched its road line at the Sea Otter Classic. That initial introduction included both the Force and Rival groups. Early last fall at the Eurobike tradeshow, SRAM unveiled Red. And now SRAM introduced improved Force and Rival groups, by incorporating the most pertinent shifting technologies of the Red group; namely Zero Loss and its adjustable reach levers.

It was a mur too far for Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto) as Kim Kirchen (High Road) sprang past the attacking Australian on the final ramps of the knee-busting steeps up the Mur de Huy on Wednesday to win a wet and wild Flèche Wallonne.

Joy Industrial's Novatec hubs may become a popular item among wheelbuilders, because they allow relatively easy swaps between four different front hub/fork drop out standards. Riders with multiple wheels and forks in their garages also might find these hubs convenient. The 4in1 front hubs can interchange — without tools — to fit standard quick releases, or 9mm, 15mm or 20mm thru axles.

You don’t need to tell J.J. Haedo to harden up — he’s tough enough; he’s racing in Georgia with a broken wrist. He’s got a little extra tape on his bars to soften the ride as well as on his wrist as a brace, but that’s it. He’s a tough guy. As for his bike, it’s a pretty standard issue. VeloNewsTechnical Editor Matt Pacocha checked it out Tuesday.

A tender hand didn’t slow CSC’s J.J. Haedo in the sprint finale of the second stage of the Tour de Georgia. Haedo took a convincing win in Augusta ahead of High Road’s Greg Henderson, stage 1 winner Ivan Dominguez (Toyota-United) and Tyler Farrar (Slipstream-Chipotle). Just a week out of a cast, Haedo is riding Georgia with his left hand heavily taped. Tuesday’s flat to rolling stage from Statesboro concluded after two, 5-mile laps of Augusta that ventured across the Savannah River into South Carolina.

People constantly ask me, “What do you see as the next big innovation coming with road bikes?” Their eyes tend to glaze over if I reply with any of the incremental improvements that every bike show or exhibition, like last week’s Sea Otter, is rife with. A new oversized bottom bracket standard will only briefly hold their interest. No, they want the goods, the “Next Big Thing.” It looks like the third coming of electronic shifting may be here soon, so mentioning that will no longer placate them. But what else is coming around the bend?

Kenda showed a 650B (also known as 27.5-inch) John Tomac Nevegal at the Taipei Cycle show last month. The company showed the new tire diameter in a 2.35-inch width and said a 2.1-inch width will be available soon. The diameter splits the difference between traditional 26-inch mountain bike sizes and the fast growing 29-inch hoops, said Kenda's Jim Wannamaker. "From a design standpoint, this new wheel size makes sense. It allows a bigger wheel to be

Rather than sitting on their hands after a couple of years of furious product development, SRAM engineers have been hard at work coming up with more new stuff for road, mountain and triathlon bikes.

Avid Elixir

Ivan Dominguez won stage 1 of the 2008 Tour of Georgia on a unique bike, built with Fuji’s Aloha CF1 carbon fiber time-trial frame mated to the brand’s standard FC-330 road fork. VeloNews technical editor Matt Pacocha managed to check out the bike before Dominguez launched it to victory.

The sixth Tour de Georgia began Monday with a short and — for Toyota-United — sweet stage from Tybee Island into Savannah. Ivan Dominguez battled his way through the well-orchestrated lead-outs of Gerolsteiner and High Road to take a commanding sprint win on the 70.4-mile flat stage ahead of Jelly Belly’s Nic Sanderson and Gerolsteiner’s Robert Förster.

Fox has a slew of improvements to its product line for 2009, but two stand apart: A remote lockout for the F80, 100, 120 RL forks and a new thru-axle standard called 15QR, which is an option for all of its 32mm stanchion forks.

The Everti 29R is a hardtail titanium 29er frame, designed and built in British Columbia. Kurt Knock of Everti said the frame has been in development for about a year. It features 3/2.5 titanium, with double-butted top and seat tubes, and straight-gauge elsewhere. The downtube is oversized and ovalized at the head tube, and the head tube is longer than most 29ers to distribute the extra stress created by a longer fork, Knock said. The frame also features a mini-gusset at the head tube/downtube juncture and full length cable housing.

Technical writer Lennard Zinn is canvassing Sea Otter for tidbits — today he comes back with (among other things), three different ways on one team to devise a 2X9 system on a cross country bike.

Julien Absalon can cross Houffalize off his list. Before his victory at Sunday’s World Cup opener in Belgium, the Frenchman had won on every classic World Cup course save this one. In 2007 he came close, but had to settle for second behind a streaking Jose Antonio Hermida.

It might surprise you to find out just what it takes to build a one-off bike. Travis Brown can sure tell you. The Trek test rider and product developer lost one after last year’s early fall single-speed world championships. Trek built Brown a custom polished one of a kind 69er single speed for the event in September. After a pre-ride, derby and race, Brown UPS’d his bike back to the U.S. and the men in brown promptly lost it.

The Cauberg climb was the scene of a stunning finale Sunday of a wild, action-packed Amstel Gold Race that saw Damiano Cunego (Lampre) score a huge victory against the attacking Frank Schleck (CSC). Realizing his only shot against faster rivals such as Cunego and third-place finisher Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d’Epargne) was to attack, the Luxembourger surged away with a vengeance with 500 meters to go to drop everyone out an elite group of nine riders except Cunego. Schleck’s raid almost worked, but Italy’s “Little Prince” had another ending in mind.

Powerful gusting winds didn’t sway 19-year-old Tiffany Cromwell (Colavita Olive Oil-Sutter Home) or Michael Grabinger (Successful Living), who took NRC victories on the Laguna Seca Raceway Saturday at the Sea Otter Classic. The men’s and women’s events played out very differently. Cromwell rode solo off the front of a break for the final few laps. Grabinger, however, made it into an unusual four-man breakaway with two teammates and David Clinger (Rock Racing). The men lapped the field — twice — before Successful Living lined up a leadout in the stiff crosswind.

Near-record setting temperatures sent dust, gravel and rocks flying at the Tour of the Battenkill Valley on Saturday, but racers from the Great White North, perhaps the least adjusted to the heat, managed to dominate the event. Bruno Langlois, racing for Team Volkswagen, pipped five-time Canadian national champion Mark Walters (Team R.A.C.E.), following an 82-mile event that sent racers over a combination of dirt and paved roads in a quiet corner of New York State.

As the Sea Otter Classic swings into full force in addition to people pouring in for the festival and the races kicking into gear, there proved to be no shortage of new stuff to see. The weather is holding, which is always a question in April on the Monterey Peninsula, so without further ado let us dive right into it.

Giant Bicycles gets to add one more Super D win to go with the two it picked up last year in the debut event at the Sea Otter Classic. Carl Decker succeeded in overpowering former World Cup downhill pro Jurgen Beneke (Marin/Mercury Rev) on a short climb near the top and managed to stay away from Beneke for the remainder of the three-mile race. "I wanted to be up over the top before Jurgen, who is very strong in the downhill," said Decker.

Trek development rider Travis Brown was at the Trek team truck at the Sea Otter Classic sporting a never-before-seen set of white and red Bontrager mountain bike shoes. The shoes have a large RXL logo on the middle strap that threw many for a loop. "People keep asking me if they’re from Polo Sport," said Brown. Ralph Lauren was a common sight at Sea Otter in previous years with his now dissolved RLX Polo Sport mountain bike team.

With the world’s best racers descending upon Houffalize, Belgium, for the World Cup opener, the Sea Otter Classic needed to supplement this year’s world class downhill races with something extra to keep the event growing. For the Sea Otter, now in its 18th year, the answer was to bolster the festival and promote the tradeshow aspect of the event. It’s a trend that has been building for the last few years as more and more manufacturers are using the Sea Otter as a launching point for new product coming down the pike.

A Nevada court has delayed ruling on a request by the owners of Lew Racing to bar competitor Edge Composites from displaying or selling products that Lew alleges were made using a “secret process” it developed.

High Road's Edvald Boasson Hagen won in a sprint between four breakaway companions to prevail in the GP Denain on Thursday. The 20-year-old Hagen took a commanding win over AG2R's Jimmy Casper and Credit Agricole's Jimmy Engoulvent. FDJ's Fredric Guesdon trailed by 10 seconds. Hagen was part of a day-long break of 15 that was then whittled down to six riders on the last lap.

High Road's Mark Cavendish won the 207km Grand Prix de l'Escaut (also known as the Scheldeprijs Vlaanderen) for the second successive year on Wednesday just ahead of top sprinters Tom Boonen of Belgium and Australia's Robbie McEwen. Germany's Eric Zabel took fourth place but it needed a photo-finish to separate Cavendish and former world road race champion Boonen.

Dear Lennard,
I've just read your article article about the SRAM ceramic bottom bracket and its maintenance. We at CeramicSpeed have been working with ceramic bearings for the past 11 years, introducing systems for bicycle applications eight years ago.

Kyle Gritters (Health Net-Maxxis) broke free from a large break to take first at the Garrett Lemire Memorial Grand Prix Sunday in Ojai, California. He was followed closely by teammate John Murphy and Toyota-United’s Hilton Clarke. Australian Tiffany Cromwell (Colavita-Sutter Home) soloed across the line in the women’s race, well ahead of teammate Iona Wynter-Parks, who also finished alone, before Rachel Tzinberg (Bicycle John’s) took the bunch sprint just seconds later.

The nasty rain didn’t show up for the 106th Paris-Roubaix, but a superb Tom Boonen sure did. On a Sunday of cool sunshine and favorable winds, the Quick Step team leader took his second Roubaix victory, three years after the first, with an unstoppable sprint over his final breakaway companions Fabian Cancellara (CSC) and Alessandro Ballan (Lampre).

Spain's Alberto Contador overcame toothache to add the Tour of the Basque Country to his triumph in last year's Tour de France after success in the sixth and final stage here Saturday. The Astana ace, who has dominated the week since taking the first stage, beat Australian Cadel Evans by 20 seconds in the 20km individual time trial to wrap up the ProTour event. Evans (Silence-Lotto) finished second too in the overall standings, 30sec adrift.

Team High Road's Chantal Beltman won the Ronde Van Drenthe race on Saturday, notching the team's second consecutive World Cup win. World champion Marianne Vos was second and High Road's Ina-Yoko Teutenberg was third at the race held in Drenthe, The Netherlands. The route includes several cobbled sections. Beltman took off in a three-woman breakaway after the second section of cobbles and broke away from the group with five kilometers left in the race. She built up a maximum lead of just 20 seconds, and finished 6 seconds ahead of the chase.

Italy's Damiano Cunego, riding for Lampre, won Friday's penultimate fifth stage of the Vuelta al Pais Vasco (the Tour of the Basque Country), a 162km run between Vitoria and Orio. Spain's Alberto Contador crossed the line in second in the same time as Cunego to retain the overall lead he's held since the first stage. Cunego lies second, eight seconds adrift. The day's ride was held in hostile weather and was marked by numerous falls just before the finish triggered by a near-the-line collision between Ricardo Ricco and David Herrero.