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Team CSC-Saxo Bank battered and isolated race leader Cadel Evans in the first Alpine stage Sunday, coming away with the yellow jersey on the shoulders of Frank Schleck as the GC race tightened.[nid:80475] Evans fell to third, one second behind Gerolsteiner's Bernard Kohl and eight seconds behind Schleck. American Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Chipotle) is in fifth at 38 seconds, still very much in the hunt.
Kelly Benjamin of Cheerwine Pro Cycling and Andrew Pinfold of the hometown Symmetrics Pro Cycling won Saturday's Bosa Properties Criterium; the fourth win for each of them at Canada's seven-event BC Superweek. Benjamin threw her bike across the finish line just ahead of Australian Ruth Corsets for the win. The Kansas City cyclist immediately raised her arms in victory, although it took officials a few minutes to examine the photo-finish before they declared her the winner.
Quadruple stage winner Mark Cavendish has pulled out of the Tour de France prior to the 15th stage, the first of three days in the Alps here Sunday, according to his Columbia team. Cavendish has been one of the stars of the July 5-27 race so far, winning four bunch sprints to set a new British record for stage wins in a single edition. He was victorious on stages 5, 8, 12 and 13. But the 23-year-old from the Isle of Man admitted he was suffering fatigue following two tough weeks of racing. "I've done enough here with four stages," said Cavendish.
Kenyan-born Briton Chris Froome hit out at Barloworld teammate Moises Duenas here on Saturday after the Spaniard's positive doping control at the Tour de France. Duenas's positive test for the banned blood booster EPO (erythrpoietin) on stage 4 has been one of three on the race, but is the first to force a drastic decision on the part of a team sponsor. On Saturday Barloworld, which made its debut on the Tour last year when Robbie Hunter won his first stage and Colombian Mauricio Soler won the King of the Mountains jersey, said it was quitting the sport.
Last year Adam Craig came to Mount Snow for the USA Cycling national mountain bike championships with a pretty good idea he’d win. And he did, by a whopping three minutes. That wasn’t the case in 2008. While Craig did emerge victorous from the race, finishing ahead of Kona’s Ryan Trebon by just over two minutes, the Giant rider didn’t expect to cross the line first. Drained by a season spent chasing Olympic selection and facing a fast, less-technical course, altered by race officials for erosion reasons, Craig simply hoped for the best.
Spaniard Oscar Freire should now have a better idea of whether he can keep the Tour de France green jersey, after some in-race consultation with sprint rival Mark Cavendish. Cavendish, the winner of four sprint stages so far, was conspicuous by his absence on Saturday as Freire claimed his first win of this year's race from yet another bunch sprint at the end of the 194km 14th stage.
CAV EXIT LIKELY: Mark Cavendish’s dream Tour de France is likely over as it’s expected that the British sprinter won’t take the start for Sunday’s opening salvo into the Alps. Cavendish won four sprint stages, but struggled to maintain the pace over a fourth-category climb with 9.5km to go to the line in Dignes-les-Bains. He popped off the back of the peloton and rolled across the line 108th at 3:27 back.
Last year the bikes Lampre riders showed up to the Tour with were well used, all looked battle worn with chipped paint and rusted bolts from the harsh weather and frequent washing by the mechanics.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the 14th stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 194.5-kilometer race from Nimes to Digne les Baines.
Rock Racing’s Tyler Hamilton on Saturday defended his overall lead in China's Tour of Qinghai Lake, holding a ten-second lead going into Sunday's final stage. Hamilton won Friday's stage 8 — his first race win in four years — by outsprinting Poland's Mark Rutkiewicz. The pair finished more than a minute ahead of the field including former race leader Hossein Askari (Tabriz Petrochemical Team). The win moved him from fourth to first place.
Until Mark Cavendish came on the pro scene just over a year ago, the most successful British Tour sprinter was Barry Hoban, who won eight stages between 1967 and 1975. Hoban was not a natural sprinter, but he could sustain a long finishing effort and he won stages with smart positioning. He rarely had any support from his French team, Mercier, which was devoted to protecting its team leader Raymond Poulidor. The only other British Tour rider to win field sprints was Michael Wright, who took three stages between 1965 and 1973.
He's known for being a joker among a cosmopolitan team that came to the Tour de France proclaiming their "clean" approach to racing would help smooth their way to success. But when it gets serious in the hectic bunch sprints, curly-haired Briton Mark Cavendish doesn't have time for practical jokes. Cavendish reinforced his status as arguably the fastest sprinter in the world on Friday when he claimed his fourth stage win of this year's edition.
The first radio communication, not one minute after we rolled through K0 was from Millar: “We’ve got a CBF’d Friday boys, it’s bloody wonderful!” The neutral was stressful with a strong crosswind threatening to make the race a crazy one, but I didn’t even get above 200 watts before the field had shut down the road and all you could here were screams, yells and whistles of “pisseee, piano, grupetto.” The first attack was off, and we CREPT for a lovely 30k through the countryside of southern France, truly enjoying a lazy start to the day.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the 13th stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 182-kilometer race from Narbonne to Nimes.
Team Columbia's Mark Cavendish won his fourth stage of this year's Tour de France, sprinting into Nimes ahead of Silence Lotto's Robbie McEwen. McEwen took a brief respite from protecting team leader Cadel Evans' overall lead to contest the sprint, but was little match for Cavendish's finishing kick. Evans, meanwhile, finished with the leaders to preserve his one-second overall lead over CSC's Frank Schleck. Cavendish said his velodrome-honed kick saved the day.
Editor's Note: It's official: Team Giant's Adam Craig is one of two men picked for the U.S. Olympic cross-country team. He continues to share his journals with VeloNews readers as he races around the world. This week he report on some East Coast racing: Windham, New York, last week and the national mountain bike championships at Mount Snow, Vermont, this weekend. Enjoy.
Australia's Cadel Evans has called on cycling's detractors to take a long hard look at what is being done in the sport to clean up its image. For the second consecutive day the Tour de France was rocked by controversy following the news that Italian climber Riccardo Ricco had become the third rider to test positive for the banned blood booster EPO (erythropoietin). Ricco won two climbing stages last week, becoming one of the most followed riders in the Pyrenees where he left many established climbers — including Evans — in his wake with his lightning fast accelerations.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the 12th stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 168.5-kilometer stage from Lavelanet to Narbonne.
Mark Cavendish (Team Columbia) won the 12th stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France — his third stage of this year’s race — as Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto) retained the leader’s yellow jersey.[nid:80277] "I’m a bit tired now but I was still fastest across the line," said a weary Cavendish with a chuckle. "I’m glad I could do that for my teammates. It’s just so nice to get another one." Evans also praised his team for its efforts on a hot, windy stage.
With the Pyrénées in the rearview mirror, the riders in the 95th Tour de France can now look forward to three less nervous stages across the South of France, where the main obstacle to overcome will be the heat. Temperatures will be in the upper-80s by the end of Thursday’s stage 12 in Narbonne, and somewhat warmer the following two days.
CSC’s Kurt Asle Arvesen emerged atop a successful 12-man break to take the 11th stage of the Tour de France Wednesday, outsprinting a group of four riders that gapped the group near the end of the 167.5km race from Lannemesan to Foix. Following a rest day and a big GC battle on the slopes of Hautacam on Monday, the moderate stage in the foothills of the Pyrenees offered a good opportunity for a break to form and Arvesen managed to join the decisive move that formed at 20km into the stage.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the 11th stage of the 2008 Tour de France, a 167.5-kilometer race from Lannemezan to Foix.
With the GC placings sorted out at Hautacam, and the Pau rest day having given riders time to recover, the attacks are sure to come thick and fast on this final Pyrenean stage. It’s not a particularly difficult one.
When Phil Anderson became the first rider from the Southern Hemisphere to wear the yellow jersey at the Tour de France back in 1981, the French called him “Le Kangourou” simply because he’s Australian. Almost three decades later, this Tour’s new maillot jaune, Cadel Evans, might well be named the “Boxing Kangaroo” after the courageous way he picked himself off the canvas Sunday and came back Monday to fend off his closest opponents and take the overall lead.
Cadel Evans (Silence-Lotto) seized the yellow jersey atop Hautacam on Monday as Leonardo Piepoli (Saunier Duval-Scott) won the mountainous stage 10 of the Tour de France, while Garmin-Chipotle's Christian Vande Velde solidified his third-place overall standing. "I can't believe it now and I couldn't believe it on the podium," said a tearful Evans, the first Australian to wear the yellow jersey since sprinter Robbie McEwen in 2004. "Yesterday was by far my Tour low and today it's definitely my Tour high. Only 26 hours have passed and it's been a bit of a rollercoaster."
Columbia’s Ina-Yoko Teutenberg won the final stage of the Giro d’Italia Femminile today finishing the ten day tour with four stage wins and the Points Jersey. “I think this week was something that happens once in a lifetime,” said Teutenberg. “I’ve never won four stages in a tour before and I’m pretty sure it won’t happen again. It was a great week and it’s really nice to finish in the Points Jersey.” The final stage started with a climb and went directly into seven relatively flat stages around the city of Desio.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the 10th stage of the Tour de France, a 156-kilometer race from Pau to the summit finish at Hautacam.
The paint job on Erik Zabel’s Colnago was originally used 25 years ago, but even that classic look can not hide the new form beneath it. Zabel debuted Colnago’s new EPS (Extreme Power Special) frame at this year’s and is the only rider using in the peloton.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the 10th stage of the Tour de France, a 156-kilometer race from Pau to the summit finish at Hautacam.
Though not the French version he’d hoped to don this July, Levi Leipheimer (Astana) did appreciate the Oregonian yellow jersey he slipped on Sunday at the close of the Cascade Cycling Classic’s sixth and final stage, the Awbry Butte Circuit Race. Atop the podium alongside BMC riders Jeff Louder in second and South African Darren Lill in third, the two-time Tour of California winner smiled when handed the CCC trophy: “They didn’t even give me a trophy at the Dauphine!”
Riccardo Ricco (Saunier Duval-Scott) won the ninth stage of the Tour de France on Sunday in a bold solo assault, while Kim Kirchen (Team Columbia) finished safely with the bunch to retain the overall lead.
Not to minimize Stefan Schumacher’s surprising stage 4 time trial win, but the 2008 Tour de France saw its first truly amazing performance Sunday as Saunier Duval-Scott’s Ricardo Riccò rode away from the best riders in the world to take his second stage win in four days.
Hilton Clarke (Toyota-United Pro) sprinted to victory in the Louisville Metro Police Foundation Criterium on Saturday. The Aussie outkicked Adam Bergman (Texas Roadhouse) to win the 90-minute NRC event, run on an eight-corner course at Waterfront Park. The two had been part of a six-man break — three of them Texas Roadhouse riders — that eventually lapped the field.
A thrilling two-up sprint, contested by 2008 Olympian Adam Craig (Giant) and Mathieu Toulouse (Maxxis), ushered in what will likely be the first of many NMBS races at Windham Mountain. After racing four laps of the newly constructed course at this first-time venue in New York’s Catskill Mountains, Toulouse took the win by a wheel over Craig. Both finished within a second of each other, stopping the clock at 1:35:10.7 and 1:35:11, respectively. Jeremiah Bishop (Trek-VW) was third.
Moises Aldape (Team Type 1) and Kristin Armstrong (Cervelo-Lifeforce) proved victorious in their respective races in Saturday’s fifth stage of the Cascade Cycling Classic, the Pacific Power-Cascade Lakes road race, which ended in the parking lot of the Mt. Bachelor Ski Resort. After being in a break almost the entire day, Aldape outsprinted second placed Chad Beyer (unattached) and Bradley White (Successful Living) at the line.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the ninth stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 224-kilometer race from Toulouse to Bagneres-de-Bigorre.
American Taylor Phinney won a world junior championship title Saturday in the 3,000m individual pursuit in Cape Town, South Africa. In addition to collecting another world junior title to go with the world junior time trial mantle he picked up last year, the 18-year-old also received confirmation that his preparation for the Beijing Olympic Games is on track. Another American, Colleen Hayduk from Kutztown, Pennsylvania, scored a bronze medal in the scratch race in the first day of competition.
Sprinters who are capable of winning stages of the Tour de France rarely keep winning for long. They either burn themselves out (either mentally or physically) or soon lose the leg-speed that’s so essential for winning a highly charged field sprint at 40 mph. In view of the astounding finishing speed and dominant margins of victory shown by Team Columbia’s Mark Cavendish in his stage wins at Toulouse on Saturday (and in Châteauroux on Wednesday), I thought it was worth seeing where the 22-year-old Brit stacks up again great sprinters in recent Tour history.
You might call it greed or an addiction to victory. Team Columbia — simultaneously eager to protect Kim Kirchen's overall lead and set up sprinter Mark Cavendish for a stage win — controlled the peloton for most of Saturday's eighth stage of the Tour de France. The U.S.-based team kept an early break's lead to a manageable gap and then put the hammer down in the last 10k to reel it in and deliver its young British fast man to his second Tour stage victory.
and welcome to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the eighth stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 172.5-kilometer race from Figeac to Toulouse.
WHAT MAKES CAV SO FAST?
It looks like Mark Cavendish was born to win.
Despite losing the wheel of his lead-out man Gerard Ciolek after riding cautiously through the final bend with just over one kilometer to go to avoid crashing on wet roads, Great Britain’s “Cannonball” was still able to blast across the line with apparent ease to win for the second time in a week.
At 23, Cavendish is using his raw finishing speed and tenacious personality to make up for any lack of experience he might have in what is his third grand tour start.
With their participation at the Beijing Olympics just a month away, Levi Leipheimer (Astana) and Kristin Armstrong (Cervelo Lifeforce) made the most of their last time trial before the Games by putting significant time into their opponents in Friday’s stage 3 Skyliner’s Time Trial at the Cascade Cycling Classic.
Astana’s René Haselbacher outsprinted his breakaway companion at the end of the fifth stage of the Tour of Austria Friday, winning the 185 kilometer race from Neustadt to Bad Vöslau and grabbing the points jersey for his efforts as well.
USA Cycling has added the final three names to its 24-member Beijing Olympic cycling squad. Roadies Amber Neben (Irvine, California) and Christine Thorburn (Sunnyvale, California) and mountain biker Mary McConneloug (Chilmark, Massachusetts) are the latest additions to the squad that will represent the United States in China next month. They join the 21 riders USA Cycling announced on July 1 (list below). The three earned discretionary selections and were nominated by a nine-person selection committee. A second Games for Thorburn[nid:79896]
The first skirmishes in the battle for the Tour de France yellow jersey left damage in their wake during the tumultuous seventh stage to here on Friday. But the biggest souvenir from the second day of climbing in the 'medium' mountain stages was the full exposure of the existing rivalry between three of Luxembourg's most talented bike riders. In one corner is Kim Kirchen, the Columbia team leader who has been wearing the yellow jersey since the end of Thursday's sixth stage.
To VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the seventh stage of the 95th Tour de France, a 159 kilometer ride from Brioude to Aurillac.
After seven stages, the 2008 Tour de France is one-third over and starting to take shape, even with the Monday’s first high-mountain stage looming in the distance. Four of the first week’s six road stages have seen separation on the day’s final climb, with the race’s GC contenders coming to the fore to show their cards and limit their losses. And in an unusual twist, the race has seen only one field sprint, won by Columbia’s Mark Cavendish, and its first solo breakaway victory, won Friday by Caisse d’Epargne’s Luis-Leon Sanchez.
Belgian-based frame builder Ridley has completed two new models in time for this year’s Tour de France with the goal of putting Silence-Lotto's top rider on the top step of the podium in Paris on July 27. Anyone can hope, of course, but Ridley has the technological chops to back it up. Aside from Team Columbia's prototype Giant, which we’ll look at in another piece, Ridley’s Dean and Noah are the big tech stories of this year’s Tour. And, unlike Columbia's new time-trial bike, both Ridley models are slated for 2009 production.
While the spectacular battle for stage 6 unfolded on the erratic climb to Super-Besse on Thursday, I was standing at the finish line next to Bob Stapleton, the owner-manager of Team Columbia. As we watched, we speculated whether his team leader Kim Kirchen could make up the 12 seconds by which he trailed Stefan Schumacher and take the yellow jersey. Right then, as Kirchen and the other race contenders were about to start their sprint for the line, Schumacher fell off his bike.
Team Columbia’s André Greipel won the fourth stage of the 60th edition of the International Tour of Austria on Wednesday, outsprinting Astana’s René Haselbacher and Danilo Hondo (Serramenti) at the end of a 216.8-kilometer race from Lienz to Wolfsberg.
Team Type 1's Matt Wilson crossed the finish line just ahead of Garmin-Slipstream’s Tom Peterson to win Thursday’s second stage of the Cascade Cycling Classic, and also slipped on the yellow leader’s jersey. Most important to him, though, was dedicating the wins to Ben Brooks, his Aussie teammate who remains in a nearby hospital in stable condition after a serious crash in the first stage. [nid:79776]
Saunier Duval’s Riccardo Riccò put his money where his mouth was on the summit finish of stage 6, sprinting uphill for the win ahead of overall race favorites Alejandro Valverde and Cadel Evans. Team Columbia’s Kim Kirchen finished just behind to take the yellow jersey, as race leader Stefan Schumacher (Gerolsteiner) crashed within the final kilometer and lost 30 seconds. (The final 3km mercy rule, which gives crashed riders the same time as the group they came out of, does not apply on summit finishes.) Ironically, it was Kirchen’s wheel with which Schumacher collided.
to VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the sixth stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 195.5-kilometer ride from Aigurande to Super-Besse.
RICCO A LA PANTANI?
Will Riccardo Riccò pull a page from the playbook of his childhood hero, Marco Pantani, and surprise everyone at this Tour de France?
Riccò insists he’s here only for stage victories, but his impressive pop in Thursday’s stage could betray his public declarations.
With 10km to go in stage 5 of the Tour de France, Mark Cavendish’s Team Columbia teammates drilled it at the front of the chaotic peloton, burying themselves to set up their British sprint star. With 150 meters to go — and early breakaway rider Nicolas Vogondy of Agritubel still barely clear of the chase — Cavendish lit it up and repaid his teammates with a dominant win ahead of Oscar Freire (Rabobank) and Erik Zabel (Milram). Race leader Stefan Schumacher (Gerolsteiner) finished in the bunch to retain the yellow jersey.
There’s no arguing that this year’s Cascade Cycling Classic is filled with world-class talent. Two world champion time trialists took the men’s and women’s wins in Wednesday’s stage 1 Prineville Road Race in Bend, Oregon: Colombian Santiago Botero (Rock Racing) and Kristin Armstrong (Cervelo Lifeforce). Both part of large breaks in their respective races – Botero in a group of 12 and Armstrong in a group of 7 – they each left their competition behind on the final climb to the finish on Pilot Butte.
The French fans finally saw a real sprint finish Wednesday — resulting in a superbly confident first Tour stage win for Team Columbia’s young Manxman Mark Cavendish — but his well-placed GC teammates, along with the other race favorites, are already looking ahead to the next three stages through the low mountains of the Massif Central. Besides heading into the hills Thursday, the riders will be racing into summer temperatures as the Tour now heads south before arriving in the Pyrenees on Sunday.
Wednesday’s 232km stage from Cholet to Chatearoux might have been the fifth stage of this 2008 Tour de France, but in many respects it was a day of firsts. It was the first hot, sunny day of a Tour that began in the rain and cold winds of Brittany — weather that seemed to follow the peloton wherever it traveled. Stage 5 was the first day spent in the malliot jaune for Gerolsteiner’s Stefan Schumacher, an unlikely hero who seems as surprised as everyone else to find himself leading the world’s biggest bike race.
Stage 5, Cholet to Châteauroux, 232km Weather: Partly cloudy in the morning, warm and sunny in afternoon, moderate westerly breeze with 20kph, highs in the low 80s
To VeloNews.com's Live Coverage of the fifth stage of the 95th edition of the Tour de France, a 232 race from Cholet to Chateauroux.
This Tour de France couldn’t be going any better for Cadel Evans. In four days of racing he and his Silence-Lotto team have ridden conservatively, largely out of the spotlight — just like the modest Aussie wants it. He showed his form was coming along nicely on opening day, losing by just one second to the explosive Alejandro Valverde on the uphill finish at Plumelec. On stages 2 and 3, his team kept him near the front of the peloton all day, well away from the crashes that were all too common.