A fast start to the 2008 Tour de Georgia saw Ivan Dominguez take the first stage sprint into Savannah. Casey Gibson was there to catch the riders en route.

One of the most interesting moments of the Tour de Georgia’s opening stage developed midway through the race, when two former overall winners, Chris Horner and Tom Danielson, jumped into a 13-man breakaway following the second intermediate sprint. Also in the breakaway were CSC’s Bobby Julich and Rock Racing’s Victor Hugo Peña. And while Horner is clearly in Georgia to ride for Astana team leader Levi Leipheimer, Danielson, who has been nursing a herniated L5 vertebra tracing back to the opening stage of the 2007 Vuelta España, entered the race as an unknown factor.

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.

This week coach Frank Overton will be analyzing the power readings from Health Net-Maxxis rider Frank Pipp, as he competes in the Tour de Georgia. VeloNews will be sharing Pipp's SRM power files and Overton's analysis after each stage. Those interested in seeing the complete power files can download them from Fascatcoaching.com. What follows is Overton's preview of the race. -- Editor

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.

Two of Italy’s biggest stars are on the mend and hope to be back at their best in time for major upcoming goals. Two-time world champ Paolo Bettini is skipping both Amstel Gold Race and Flèche Wallone due to a broken rib suffered in last week’s Vuelta al País Vasco while Daniele Bennati will finally make his debut with Liquigas following a lengthy recovery from a knee injury.

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.

Anna Milkowski is a member of Team Advil-Chapstick. This diary entry was completed a few hours after she won the 2008 Tour of the Battenkill Valley in New York — Editor Redlands exists as a haze — a temporary exchange of lobster gloves and neoprene flippers for sunscreen and swimming pools — then a quick return to winter. The experience hinted I had survived this challenging winter of indoor riding and even a yard-sale crash on black ice, but the season began for real today with the Battenkill Roubaix in Salem, New York.

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.

The list of favorites for Sunday's Amstel Gold Race seems nearly as long as the number of years the race has been held: 43. For the first time in more than a decade, neither one of Holland’s eternal favorites for Amstel Gold — Erik Dekker or Michael Boogerd — can be counted on to carry national pride. Each won Amstel once, beating Lance Armstrong each time in what was one of the biggest wins in each of their respective careers.

Team Type 1 Sets Sights On A Stage Win In Georgia Tybee Island, Ga. — Team Type 1 brings an arsenal to the Tour de Georgia presented by AT&T that is equipped to deliver a stage win during the seven-day, 590-mile (949.5 km) race that begins Monday. Team Type 1’s roster for the race will be Emile Abraham (TRI), Moises Aldape (MEX), Fabio Calabria (AUS), Glen Chadwick (AUS), Chris Jones (USA), Valeriy Kobzarenko (UKR), Ian MacGregor (USA) and Matt Wilson (AUS).

With no individual time trial and a trip planned up the steep Brasstown Bald mountain, the seven-day 2008 Tour de Georgia presented by AT&T, appears to be a climber’s race. Odds-on race favorites include 2006 overall winner Tom Danielson (Slipstream-Chipotle), Astana’s U.S. national champion Levi Leipheimer and Rock Racing’s Spanish climbing sensation Oscar Sevilla.

Click here for complete Tour de Georgia coverage Monday, April 21, stage 1 — The race will make its first ever visit to the seacoast when it starts at Tybee Island. The 71.8-mile stage passes through the coastal lowcountry, with several intermediate sprints before the finish in Savannah. The race has not visited the historic city since it hosted the prologue in 2003.

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 is prepared for a tough tactical battle in the Tour of Georgia, says team sports director Allan Peiper. “With the decisive stage to the Brasstown Bald climb coming late in the race, and the team time trial preceding that, teams will have to keep their options open for as long as possible. We’ll be looking to do our best throughout.”

Riders and families of the NorCal High School Mountain Bike League were greeted by a warm beautiful Monterey day when they all came out for race 4 in sunny Fort Ord. The unexpected warm temperatures added an extra stress for racers, but true to League character, most persevered to the end. Although the location was the same as the season opener, it was a very different race. With a few more steep hills, a downhill sand pit, some newly added windy single track, and poison oak that was in full bloom, the course provided a day full of epic attacks, surprises, and mishaps.

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.

Stuart O'Grady took another step towards erasing the memory of the Tour de France crash which nearly ended his career with a stunning ride at the Paris-Roubaix classic Sunday. O'Grady, the first Australian to claim cycling's biggest one-day prize in 2007, went into the cobblestone-riddled epic lacking full form and knowing that only "a miracle" would give him the chance of a repeat. But he produced a stunner to finish fifth shortly after his CSC team leader Fabian Cancellara had been humbled only by an explosive winning sprint from Belgian Tom Boonen.

Italian sprinting star Alessandro Petacchi continued his 2008 winning ways in the Tour of Turkey (UCI 2.1/April 14-20). He won the first stage from Izmir to Kuþadasý in a photo finish, for his seventh win of the season. Second, by a hair, was the Argentinian Ruben Guillermo Bongiorno (CSF Group-Navigare), and third was Spaniard Javier Benitez Pomares (Benfica). The stage win also gave Petacchi the overall lead.

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).

In preparation for its first crack at Paris-Roubaix — arguably the world’s most demanding single-day event for riders and their bikes — Slipstream-Chipotle wisely called on their team captain Magnus Backstedt for technical recommendations. Maggy, the 2004 winner of the “Hell of the North,” keyed the team’s mechanics in to a few secrets of smoothing out the bumpy ride.

Dear Readers,

Welcome to the latest edition of The Prologue, VeloNews.com's weekly summary of news from the world of competitive cycling.

The season is in full swing this week with racing underway both here in the U.S. and in Europe.

Nick Nuyens proved he could ride as a classics contender with his second-place finish at Sunday’s Tour of Flanders. Nuyens, Cofidis’ newest strongman, bridged to a surging Juan Antonio Flecha in the final kilometers of Belgium’s most famous single-day race in an attempt to bring back Quick Step’s streaking Stijn Devolder. While Devolder took the win, Nuyens took the sprint for second, as well as his best-ever classics result.

Is this the year? Is this the year that the stars will be aligned for George Hincapie on the cobblestones of Paris-Roubaix? Is this the year that the tall 34-year-old American can follow up his two sixth places, two fourth places and his runner-up spot (of 2005) with another big performance on Sunday? Is this the year he can win?

VeloNews spoke with Rabobank’s Juan Antonio Flecha just a little more that 24 hours after he helped deliver teammate Oscar Freire to his win at the 70th edition of Ghent-Wevelgem.

Team High Road's Kim Kirchen won Thursday's fourth stage of the Pais Vasco in a sprint finish, while Astana's Alberto Contador retained the overall lead. It was Kirchen's second stage victory in this year's event, and left him in fifth place in the overall standings. Contador came in 20th with the same time as the stage winner to retain his overall lead, three seconds ahead of compatriot Ezequiel Mosquera. Kirchen covered the 171 kilometers between Viana and Vitoria-Gasteiz in four hours, 17 minutes and 33 seconds to edge his teammate Morris Possoni of Italy at the line.

Making their mark both stateside and in South America last weekend, Kona Factory Team riders proudly stood atop the podium in Fountain Hills, Arizona and the Pan-Am Mountain Bike Championships in Venezuela. Competing in three races last weekend at the McDowell Mountain Park in the second NMBS event, team riders Barry Wicks, Ryan Trebon and Wendy Simms all secured top-three finishes in at least one race. Kris Sneddon also competed and finished in the top-15 in all of his races.

With their morale on a high after Judith Arndt’s victory in the Tour of Flanders, High Road’s women’s team now tackle the fourth round of the World Cup this Saturday, the Ronde Van Drenthe. The high point of a three-race series in and around Drenthe, the 136.6km event features a triple ascent of the notorious Vamberg climb. 750 metres long and with sections at a 20 percent gradient, the race features a number of cobbled sections. Narrow, twisting and frequently exposed roads, not to mention potentially bad weather, make the race a tough event, normally fraught with tension.

Spain's David Herrero of the Karpin team won the 195km third stage of the Tour of the Basque Country on Wednesday between Erandio and Viana while Astana's Alberto Contador retained the overall lead. Herrero had finished third in the first two stages of the race, and now lies third overall, eight seconds behind Contador. The 28-year-old Herrero beat out compatriot Luis Leon Sanchez and Italy's Olympic champion Paolo Bettini in a sprint finish for a time of 4:54:24.

Oscar Freire’s knack for winning chaotic sprints made him a favorite to win the 70th edition of Ghent-Wevelgem as a huge 77-rider pack thundered toward the finish line in this small Belgian town. And while the cagey 32-year-old did emerge victorious to become the event’s first Spanish champion, Freire and his Rabobank teammates earned the win the old-fashioned way.

Over the years, dozens of top sprinters, from Freddy Maertens to Sean Kelly to Mario Cipollini, have won Ghent-Wevelgem, which celebrates its 70th edition on Wednesday. But the UCI ProTour classic rarely ends in a field sprint. When Cipollini earned his third Wevelgem scalp in 2002, he was in a small breakaway group with Americans Fred Rodriguez and George Hincapie. Hincapie won the race the year before in a photo-finish over Dutchman Leo Van Bon, also in a small-group sprint.

Kim Kirchen (High Road) drove a fierce sprint up a rising finish to upset two-time world champion Paolo Bettini (Quick Step) in Tuesday’s attack-riddled second stage at the Vuelta al País Vasco. Riders went down in the middle of the pack in the final surge to the line as teammate Michael Barry gave Kirchen a perfect lead-out to spring the Luxembourg all-rounder to a morale-boosting victory ahead of the Ardennes classics later this month.

Alberto Contador’s “Revenge Tour 2008” continued Monday as the Astana rider uncorked a blistering acceleration on the last of seven climbs to bolt away from a soggy and cold peloton in the 137km opener at the Vuelta al País Vasco. Contador won the stage three seconds ahead of Ezequiel Mosquera (Karpin-Galicia) and takes an unexpected eight-second lead on his main adversaries in an exciting opening day of the six-day Basque Country tour.

When it’s a hard day in the Tour of Flanders, the home riders nearly always come out on top. And Sunday’s 92nd edition of the gnarly Belgian classic was one of the hardest, with hail showers, even some snow, and long bouts of heavy rain blasting the riders through the middle part of the 264km race, which started and ended in spring sunshine. So it was fitting that the reigning champion of Belgium, Stijn Devolder of Quick Step-Innergetic, emerged with a gutsy solo triumph.

Alex Wrubleski (Webcor Builders) and Santiago Botero (Rock Racing) wrapped up the overall titles at California's Redlands Classic on Sunday. Wrubleski not only won the Beaver Medical Group Sunset Road Race in a bunch sprint, just ahead of Leigh Hobson (Cheerwine) and Kim Anderson (Team High Road), but took just enough bonus time in Sunday’s final stage of the Redlands Cycling Classic to take the overall from Mara Abbott (Team High Road) by a mere second.

Danilo Di Luca (LPR) won the Settimana Lombardia race on Sunday following the sixth and final stage over 162.7km around Bergamo. Teammates Paolo Savoldelli and Daniele Pietropolli finished second and third respectively. Italy's Francesco Failli (Acqua e Sapone), won the stage in a sprint finish. It was the 43rd career win for 32-year-old Di Luca, the reigning Giro d'Italia champion. Di Luca is embroiled in an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) to have a three-month suspension he served for a doping offense last year overturned.

German ace Judith Arndt out-kicked American Kristin Armstrong to win the women’s Tour of Flanders, the third round of the 2008 UCI women’s World Cup. It was the fourth career World Cup victory for Arndt, the silver medalist from the 2004 Olympics, and the first for her team under its new High Road label. “It was a perfect victory; a perfect day for us,” said Arndt. “It was a team victory.”

Emilia Fahlin (Team High Road) and Jeff Louder (BMC) won Saturday’s 1st Centennial Bank-KWB Wealth Managers Criterium, the second stage of the 2008 Redlands Classic in California. Fahlin, a 19-year-old Swede, took the bunch sprint ahead of a hard-driving women’s peloton in Saturday’s 1st Centennial Bank-KWB Wealth Managers Criterium. Hot on her wheel was Canadian Alex Wrubleski (Webcor Builders) and Advil-Chapstick’s Brenda Lyons.

The Absa Cape Epic stage race wrapped up Saturday with the Bulls team — comprising the German riders Karl Platt and Stefan Sahm — capturing the final stage while the overall title goes to the Cannondale Vredestein duo of Denmark's Jakob Fuglsang and Belgium's Roel Paulissen. With a nine-minute time advantage built up of over the last couple of stages, the Cannondale Vredestein team solidified their position by finishing in the lead bunch. The Bulls team secured second place overall.

Fabian Wegmann (Gerolsteiner) won in Spain and Tony Martin (High Road) took the flowers in Holland in weekend racing across Europe. In Spain’s GP Miguel Indurain, Wegmann repeated his victory from two years ago by being first up the climbing finish at the 950-meter El Puy in Estella. Wegmann profited from the work of his Gerolsteiner teammates to control the pace made easy work of Michael Albasini (Liguiqas), who crossed the line second some two seconds ahead of third-place Joaquin Rodríguez (Caisse d’Epargne).

A few glimpses of sunshine were interrupting the rain showers Saturday evening in Belgium, partially drying out the 24 sections of cobblestones and 17 hellingen included in the 92nd Tour of Flanders.

Katharine Carroll celebrates her win in the sprint, and on the podium.

Rock Racing's Santiago Botero won Friday's stage 1 circuit race at the Redlands Bicycle Classic, after soloing away from a five-man breakaway. In the women's race, Aarron's Katherine Carroll won the stage in a sprint. Casey Gibson was there to capture the action in photos.

Colombian Santiago Botero (Rock Racing) took the win in Friday’s Beaumont Circuit Race, the first stage of the Redlands Cycling Classic — and his first win in America. After working in a break with five other riders beginning in the second of five 17-mile laps, he attacked in the final lap and powered across the finish line a resounding 52 seconds ahead of Sebastian Haedo (Colavita-Sutter Home) and Burke Swindlehurst (Bissell) in second and third.

Competitive cyclists are not patient people. They tend to go directly to the pain, work too hard too early, and mistakenly overlook the real limiter of their performance simply because it doesn’t hurt enough to satisfy their addiction to pain.

Tyler Hamilton is looking at the glass half full. After the Rock Racing team captain was prohibited from racing at the Amgen Tour of California and his team was not invited to this month’s Tour de Georgia, it would be understandable for Hamilton to be discouraged following Rock’s devastating loss of the race lead by one second in the final stage criterium of the San Dimas Stage Race on Sunday. Not the case, Hamilton said Wednesday evening as he rode in a team car towards the Redlands Classic.

Under a dreary Southern California sky that made for nearly ideal time trial conditions, Mara Abbott (Team High Road) surprised few by winning the Redlands Cycling Classic prologue — The Sun Time Trial — by a resounding 25 seconds over second placed national team member Katharine Carroll (Aaron’s). Abbott’s teammate, Kim Anderson, rounded out the podium less than 1 second behind Carroll.

American cross-country mountain bike racer Adam Craig has his sights set on the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. That means for the next few months he will be battling it out on the World Cup and National Mountain Bike Series with his fellow Americans for a slot on the U.S. team. In between races, Craig skis, kayaks and is the rally car co-driver for his Giant teammate Carl Decker. VeloNews.com is along for the ride. —Editor

Oakland, CA – The NorCal High School Mountain Bike League held its third race of the season on March 30th at Grant’s Ranch Park in Santa Clara. It was a day that couldn’t decide if it was warm or cold as a steady breeze brought clouds across the venue valley. The six-mile course started riders with a long, tough climb right off the get-go that was followed by a rip-roaring descent that took riders into some mini-rollers before they had to dig in deep in the grassy start/finish area.

Leif Hoste’s dream of winning the Tour of Flanders is turning into a nightmare. Three times second in the past four years, Hoste has come as close as a Belgian rider can get to heaven without riding through the pearly gates.

Hincapie™ Sportswear, Inc., a leading manufacturer and marketer of distinctive clothing for the performance cyclist, has been chosen as the official cycling apparel supplier for the 2008 Tour de Georgia presented by AT&T (Tour) for the third consecutive year. Hincapie will provide premium, Tour-custom cycling apparel for stage winners, race leaders and souvenir sales. Designs for the 2008 award jerseys were provided for a fourth consecutive year by Bigelow Advertising, based in Atlanta, Ga.

The Redlands Classic, which begins Thursday April 3 in Southern California, marks the opening of the USA Cycling NRC series. By this time of the year, the NRC competition is usually well under way. But with the MERCO races in Merced and the Central Valley Classic in Fresno not having NRC status this year, the race for the NRC crown is off to a late start.

For the first time since winning the prologue, the MTN Energade team of Kevin Evans and David George won Thursday's 130km Absa Cape Epic stage in a sprint with two other teams. The previous day's stage winners, the Bulls team of Karl Platt and Stefan Sahm, were second, followed one second later by the Cannondale Vredestein team, Roel Paulissen and Jakob Fuglsang, who aggressively defended their overall lead. On stage 5 Paulissen had to ride the final 18km on a bare rim and the team finished in fifth position, losing about half of its overall lead.

Dutch flier Joost Posthuma (Rabobank) pulled the double in Thursday’s time trial finale at the Three Days of De Panne to claim the stage and the overall crown in one hard effort. Posthuma had just enough in the tank to erase a 27-second gap to overnight leader Enrico Gasparotto (Barloworld) to vault from eighth to the top spot on the podium.

David George and Kevin Evans of MTN 1 sprint to victory during stage 6 of the 2008 Absa Cape Epic Mountain Bike stage race from Bredasdorp to Hermanus in the Western Cape, South Africa.

For the second day in a row, British sprinter Mark Cavendish bested the pack in Belgium’s Three Days of De Panne. The High Road fastman out-kicked Francesco Chicchi (Liquigas) to win Thursday’s 119km morning sector as part of the two-stage finale. Slovenian Borut Bozic (Collstop) came through second with Danilo Napolitano (Lampre) fourth. Like he did in Wednesday’s stage, Cavendish won once again in a long sprint. Italian Enrico Gasparotto (Barloworld) conserved his leader’s jersey going into the afternoon’s decisive 14km individual time trial.

The winners of the 2007 Absa Cape Epic, the Bulls squad of Stefan Sahm and Karl Platt took their first victory of the 2008 race, winning the fifth stage from Swellendam to Bredasdorp. The two out sprinted the Alb-Gold team of Hannes Genze and Joschen Kaess for the win. The victory took a sizable chunk out of the overall lead of the Cannondale-Vredestein squad of Jakob Fuglsang and Roel Paullissen, who crossed the line in 5th place, nearly eight minutes down.

Mark Cavendish (High Road) charged to victory in Wednesday’s second stage of the Three Days of De Panne in Belgium, while Enrico Gasparotto (Barloworld) retained the overall lead. Cavendish, who notched 11 wins in his rookie season last year, unloaded an electrifying sprint to relegate Francesco Chicchi (Liquigas) to second with Sebastien Chavanel (FDJeux) coming across the line for third.

Slipstream-Chipotle’s Tom Danielson, Rock Racing’s Oscar Sevilla, Health Net-Maxxis’ Rory Sutherland and Toyota-United’s Chris Baldwin will be among the high-caliber riders rolling out of the start house Thursday at the Redlands Bicycle Classic.

It’s been a bumpy ride for Andy Bajadali. The 34-year-old has gone from pro mountain biker to pro roadie, to amateur roadie and back to pro roadie. Oh, and there was a stint living in a Turkish slum, while racing in Belgium with his buddy Alex Candelario, thrown in there for good measure. This year, Bajadali is shaking off a rough early season and heading into the Redlands Bicycle Classic as the defending champion, riding for Kelly Benefits Strategies-Medifast.

Roadie Happy Hour! Michigan Bike Race Announcer Jamie Smith and "Frazz" Illustrator Jef Mallett Launch Book at Kinetic Systems Join Jamie Smith and Jef Mallett for a book launch event at Kinetic Systems in Clarkston, Michigan, on Saturday, April 5th at 4pm. Smith and Mallett are launching their new book Roadie: The Misunderstood World of a Bike Racer during a happy hour event at the shop. ROADIE Book Launch Event Saturday, April 5 beginning at 4:00 p.m. Kinetic Systems 60 S. Main St. Clarkston, MI 48346 (248) 625-7000 www.kineticsystemsbicycles.com

The Dolphin-Trek squad of Alban Lakata and Bart Brentjens took the fourth stage of the Absa Cape Epic, winning the 121km journey from Riversdale to Swellendam in 4:28:38. The duo finished 23 seconds ahead of MTN Energade and race leaders Cannondale-Vredestein.

It's been something of a tradition here at VeloNews to start the month of April with things a bit skewed from the normal. In the past, on April 1st, we've fired Patrick O'Grady, revealed the development of new mag-lev wheel bearings, declared Dick Pound to be head of the UCI (with Hein Verbruggen taking the helm of WADA) and scorched the French countryside with fatally flawed sunflowers that perfectly match the color of the Maillot Jaune. Yup, it's April Fool's Day.

Barry Wicks’ transition from top-tier cyclocrosser to mountain bike strongman appears to be going well. The 26-year-old Kona rider, already a household name on the domestic ‘cross scene, took his first-ever NMBS victory at Sunday’s short-track in Fontana, California. Wicks out-sprinted breakaway companion Adam Craig (Giant) to take the STXC win and then followed up the victory with another win, again out sprinting Craig to take the Super D title.

If Jennie Reed couldn't quite believe her world title, then neither could the home crowd at the Manchester velodrome. Reed's jubilant gold medal in the women's keirin, the climactic event in five days of racing, was greeted with stunned silence by the British fans who had become drunk on the success that Team GB had claimed in the 2008 World Track Championships. "This is the first world championship of my career and I have got a gold medal so I am just elated," Reed said, as she came off the track.

American Jennie Reed ended Britain's gold rush when she overpowered Victoria Pendleton to win the keirin in the final event of the world track cycling championships on Sunday. Defending champion Pendleton, a gold winner in the team sprint and sprint, claimed the silver medal, with Germany's Christin Muche taking the bronze after a photo-finish decision.

Alejandro Borrajo (Colavita-Sutter Home) sprinted to victory Saturday in stage 2 of the San Dimas Stage Race. Borrajo overpowered Henk Vogels (Toyota-United) and Jonathan Cantwell (Jittery Joes) to take the 84-mile San Dimas Hospital Road Race. Oscar Sevilla (Rock Racing) retained his leader’s jersey, but at a cost — a 5 percent time cut that trimmed 17 riders from the field saw the team lose Peter Dawson, Rahsaan Bahati and Adam Switters, leaving a five-man squad to defend Sevilla’s lead in Sunday’s finale, the Incycle/Cannondale San Dimas Classic criterium.

Eric Schildge (Fiordifrutta) edged out CCB International's Colin Jaskiewicz and Daniel Estevez (CRCA/Sakonnet Technology U25) in a photo finish at the Michael Schott Memorial Race in Marblehead, Massachusetts, on Sunday. The Marblehead race, held on a rolling 2.2-mile circuit on a rocky neck jutting into the Atlantic Ocean, is one of the longest running one-day races in New England, and a traditional season opener for the New England road scene.

Australian Simon Gerrans (Crédit Agricole) won stage two of the Critérium International on Sunday ahead of breakaway companion Jens Voigt (CSC), who took the yellow jersey and seems ideally positioned for the final victory. Gerrans finished four seconds ahead of the German and 90 seconds up on Spaniard Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d’Epargne), who took the bunch sprint for third in the 98.5km stage between Les Vieilles Forges and Monthermé. The race was neutralized for more than 30 minutes because of a demonstration by employees of a nearby factory.

Carlos Hernandez (P&S-Specialized) and Leda Cox (America's Dairyland) won stage 2 of the 22nd Tucson Bicycle Classic on Saturday, a windswept affair run on a rolling, 20-mile circuit. Hernandez and teammate David Salomon finished one-two in the Sahuarita Loop Road race (80 miles for men, 60 for women). The duo crossed in 3:12:25, 13 seconds ahead of a chase group containing race leader Joshua Liberles (Colavita New Mexico-JNF), led in by Alex Bhogal (Mazurcoaching.com).

A beaming Jennie Reed, cheered on by her American teammate, Taylor Phinney, stepped down from the medal podium in Manchester after claiming the bronze medal in the women's sprints, to pronounce herself "very pleased" with her third place, behind Simona Krupeckaite of Lithuania and - look away now if you're suffering from Brit-fest fatigue - gold medal winner, Victoria Pendleton of Team GB.

Far from the hullabaloo and pre-Olympic hype surrounding Great Britain’s track team, Jennie Reed of the United States was quietly making her resolute way into the medal positions in the women's sprint finals. Reed, 29, has maintained the good form that took her to runner's up spot in the sprints in the Los Angeles World Cup earlier this year, where she also won the keirin.