Frank Schleck (Saxo Bank) and Matt Lloyd (Silence-Lotto) crashed heavily in Sunday’s Amstel Gold Race and left the course in ambulances, wearing cervical collars around their necks.
Schleck, who won here in 2006, never lost consciousness and was later diagnosed as having suffered a mild concussion, according to his team. There was no immediate word on Lloyd’s condition.
"It is not as serious as we first feared," said Saxo Bank sporting director Kim Andersen. "Frank is fine and that is the most important thing. I was really concerned for him when I saw him lying on the ground!"
Sergei Ivanov (Katusha) won the 44th edition of the Amstel Gold Race on Sunday in a dramatic two-up sprint with Saxo Bank's Karsten Kroon as a frantic chase fell just a few seconds short of success.
"For me it's the biggest win of my career," said a clearly delighted Ivanov after emerging the strongest of a final three-man break that also included Robert Gesink (Rabobank), who hung on for third on the steeps of the Cauberg, just a few seconds ahead of the charging peloton.
Evelyn Stevens (CRCA/Radical Media) out sprinted a seven-woman breakaway to win the 62-mile women's Pro-1-2-3 race at the Tour of the Battenkill Saturday.
Stevens, in her second year of racing, also won the Valley of the Sun road race in Arizona in February.
The 200km (124-mile) men's pro invitational race will be held Sunday. In Saturday's 82-mile pro-am men's race, Chad Beyer (BMC) outsprinted Bissell's Tom Zirbel to take the win. Team Type 1's Ken Hanson was third. [nid:90864]
Former Tour de France winner Jan Ullrich, who retired in 2007, could be set to return to competitive cycling as a team adviser, it was a former teammate said Sunday.
Danilo Hondo, who is competing in the Tour of Turkey for Czech team PSK Whirlpool, told the German tabloid Bild he wants to create a new cycling team and that his former Team Telekom teammate would play a role.
"Jan is always a subject (which one talks about when discussing cycling), we have talked about it," Hondo said. “Jan is always a magnet which could make things move things.”
Team Bissell again put its number to use in the Sea Otter circuit, stacking the two key moves of the day with riders. Andy Jacques-Maynes and Jeremy Vennell rode the last few laps together with Colavita’s Luis Amaran, with Jacques-Maynes attacking over the last climb and holding his gap to the finish.
Astana’s Levi Leipheimer rode comfortably in the group behind. With the three-time Tour of California champion riding the front of the chase, that group eventually whittled down to a small front group of about 10.
Halfway through the short track, it was a three-way race for the podium. And all three men were riding for Specialized: Todd Wells, Burry Stander and world champion Christoph Sauser.
Sauser burped his tire and did not finish, but Wells charged on for the win, with Stander taking second and Giant’s Carl Decker outsprinting Jeremiah Bishop (Monavie-Cannondale) for third. Kona’s Ryan Trebon and Subaru-Gary Fisher’s Sam Schultz and Jeremy Horgan-Kobelski were also in the hunt.
Riding alone the last three laps, Catharine Pendrel (Luna) looked like she had the Sea Otter short track sewn up, but Emily Batty (Trek) had other plans.
Chasing just behind with Heather Irmiger (Subaru-Gary Fisher), Batty jumped with half a lap to go on a paved climb, and held her lead to the finish.
“I just felt like I had so much energy,” Batty said. “It will be a good opener for (the cross-country race) tomorrow.”
Norway’s Lene Byberg (Specialized) leapt past Irmiger and Pendrel to finish second, with Pendrel rounding out the podium.
Ina-Yoko Teutenberg (Columbia-Highroad) sprinted to victory Ronde Van Gelderland in the Netherlands on Saturday to claim her 11th win of the 2009 season.
Teutenberg worked into the decisive 13-rider breakaway with two Columbia-Highroad teammates that pulled clear in the opening 20km. The group came back after the break lost momentum and there were a flurry of counter-attacks until it regrouped with 10km to go to set up a mass gallop.
Truvativ’s new Stylo stems. The Team level is 3D forged with 7050-alloy, and comes with titanium or stainless hardware, while the Race stems are made from 6061-alloy.
SRAM takes advantage of Sea Otter’s captive audience of domestic and international press every year with a big product launch. This year the brand showed 2010 mountain products from its RockShox, Avid, SRAM and Truvativ lines.
Rock Racing has fired domestic all-rounder Michael Creed, citing poor performance so far this season, and further reducing its roster following Friday's announcement of Tyler Hamilton's retirement.
VeloNews has been unable to confirm that two other Rock riders were dismissed this week, as well.
Rock Racing spokesmen did not immediately return phone calls and emails seeking confirmation on Saturday.
Ibis has dropouts for the Tranny with derailleur hangers or bottle openers. The design of the bike, with separate front and rear triangles and a slotted fit, allow the bike to be broken down for travel and enough chainstay adjustment to tension a single ring set up without using a horizontal dropout.
Raffling for a worthy cause is smart fundraising, according to Ibis co-owner and front man Scot Nicol.
If the product is cool, the cause is solid and the tickets aren’t too expensive, then you can raise some good money. For example: Last year Ibis donated a Silk SL road bike to fatcyclist.com to support the webmaster’s fight against cancer. That bike brought in $37,500 for the LAF foundation through the Livestrong Challenge avenue.
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Michael Lange, a 25-year-old pro cyclist who raced for Jelly Belly last year, has accepted a two-year suspension following a positive test for the stimulent Strychnine last summer at the Tour of Qinghai Lake in China.
The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, which announced the suspension, said Strychnine is prohibited under the USADA and UCI rules.
"While Mr. Lange tested positive for a specified substance and has accepted the penalty for the violation, no facts were revealed that he intentionally ingested Strychnine," USADA said in a statement.
Grega Bole (Amica Chips) sprinted to victory in Saturday’s GP Nobili Rubinetterie-Borgamanero race in Italy.
The Slovenian, third in Ronde van Drenthe on Monday, was fastest out of a winning three-man breakaway in the 191.7km course. Fortunato Baliano (CSF) wasn’t so lucky and had to settle for second while Andriy Grivko (ISD) crossed the line third.
Daniele Callegarin (CZP) led a six-man group that included former Italian national champion Giovanni Visconti (ISD) and Chris Froome (Barloworld) at 17 seconds back.
It was a battle of the Frenchmen in Saturday’s Tour du Finistère in western France in the fourth leg of the French Cup series.
Dimitri Champion (Bretagne-Schuller) lived up to his name to bring home the flowers in the 199.3km course around Quimper.
Fourth last year in the French national championships, Champion drove home a solo victory ahead of Pierrick Fédrigo (Bouygues) and Anthony Geslin (FDJeux).
Champion was part of the winning move that split in the final lap of the finishing circuit. He attacked with 8km to go and held off the chasers to snatch a hard-fought victory.
A Spanish judge has once again blocked efforts by cycling authorities to get their hands on evidence from the Operación Puerto doping ring.
Antonio Serrano — the Spanish judge who’s handled the legal proceedings since police blew the lid open on the Spanish doping scandal in May 2006 — ruled Wednesday to deny releasing Puerto evidence to the Spanish cycling federation (RFEC).