Since blogging is a great way to put off things,here I am writing a post about the first 2 stages of Paris-Nice (I should actually be reading Antonia Fraser's book about the Gunpowder Plot at the moment,but this is a nicer-although much more useless-thing to do).
So: yesterday's stage was an 8 kms long TT.Although my little cousin tried hard to ruin my afternoon,I was much more stubborn than her and I managed to watch the race.Since she was awaiting the race to end,you could imagine my great relief when,after Contador,I saw Jens Voigt at the start of the TT.In fact in that moment I had forgotten that Contador didn't win the P-N last year and therefore I feared that he could be the last rider of the race.And instead no,big Jens appeared on the screen,causing Fangirl to scream ("Allez Jens!!!!") and scare my cousin (she deserved it).
Anyway,on to the serious thing,the TT was won by Lars Boom,who really impressed me with his performance.Voigt came 2nd for 3 bloody seconds,whereas 3rd and 4th (with the same time) were Leipheimer and Contador.The Spaniard's 4th place may be considered "disappointing",but I believe that it wasn't a very bad result.After all,he can't always win.
Lots of young riders got interesting results during yesterday stage.For example,Geraint Thomas was 15th,Peter Sagan came 5th and Saxo Banker Richie Porte came 18th (yay for him!).
Frank Schleck came 85th with a delay of 48 seconds from Boom (and 42" from Contador).Logic was a bit disappointed with this result because having a 42" delay from Contador in a 8 kms long TT isn't actually very good (especially if you consider that the parcours wasn't completely flat).Fangirl replied her to shut up,because we're not in July and it's too early to start complaining about Frank's TT skills now.
Talking about other the SB riders,Didier came 151 with a delay of 1'13" from Boom,whereas Chris Sorensen came 77th,with 44" (3 seconds more than Fuglsang and 4 less than Frank) of delay from Boom.
So: yesterday's stage was an 8 kms long TT.Although my little cousin tried hard to ruin my afternoon,I was much more stubborn than her and I managed to watch the race.Since she was awaiting the race to end,you could imagine my great relief when,after Contador,I saw Jens Voigt at the start of the TT.In fact in that moment I had forgotten that Contador didn't win the P-N last year and therefore I feared that he could be the last rider of the race.And instead no,big Jens appeared on the screen,causing Fangirl to scream ("Allez Jens!!!!") and scare my cousin (she deserved it).
Anyway,on to the serious thing,the TT was won by Lars Boom,who really impressed me with his performance.Voigt came 2nd for 3 bloody seconds,whereas 3rd and 4th (with the same time) were Leipheimer and Contador.The Spaniard's 4th place may be considered "disappointing",but I believe that it wasn't a very bad result.After all,he can't always win.
Lots of young riders got interesting results during yesterday stage.For example,Geraint Thomas was 15th,Peter Sagan came 5th and Saxo Banker Richie Porte came 18th (yay for him!).
Frank Schleck came 85th with a delay of 48 seconds from Boom (and 42" from Contador).Logic was a bit disappointed with this result because having a 42" delay from Contador in a 8 kms long TT isn't actually very good (especially if you consider that the parcours wasn't completely flat).Fangirl replied her to shut up,because we're not in July and it's too early to start complaining about Frank's TT skills now.
Talking about other the SB riders,Didier came 151 with a delay of 1'13" from Boom,whereas Chris Sorensen came 77th,with 44" (3 seconds more than Fuglsang and 4 less than Frank) of delay from Boom.
Today's stage was really exciting and thrilling.In fact there was a lot of wind and this caused different crashes and many different attacks.Between the people who crashed there were Kjellstrom,Samuel Sanchez,Cunego,Leipheimer,Haussler and Contador.The Astana rider and Haussler crashed together with 3 kms to go.Anyway the Spaniard's teammate Stangelj (who was one of the protagonists of a long breakaway at the 2009 Mendrisio Worlds) immediately stopped to give his bike to Alberto who,with a little help from Rabobank's team car,managed to join the riders of the main peloton very soon.Main peloton that,however,didn't correspond to the head of the race.In fact with about 25 kms to go the riders started to use the crosswinds to create a natural selection inside the peloton.As a consequence of that,Gilbert and Weelens (who broke away from the peloton with about 50 kms to go) were caught and the peloton broke into different little groups.With about 20 kms to go,4/5 Caisse d'Epargne riders found themselves alone at the head of the race,with all the other riders behind.Valverde and Luis Leon Sanchez worked with their teammates in order to increase their advantage on the other riders,but some athletes managed to join them in spite of this.Boom for example impressed me a lot when,all alone,he closed the gap between the Caisse d'Epargne's group and other few riders.Jens Voigt soon managed to join the CdE group as well together with Kolobnev,Roche,Millar,Galland, Bole, Henderson, Marcato, Martin, Kreuziger,Ivanov and Lemoine.All these riders (or at least the majority of them) worked in order to mantain a gap on the poursuivants and they suceeded in doing so.
With 1 km to go Ivanov attacked,but he was soon caught.The next one to launch an attack was Toni Martin,but he had no luck.The victory stage was therefore decided in a sprint that was won by Greg Henderson.Second came Grega Bole,who lost the race for very few centimeters (I was actually convincted that he had won until I saw the official stage classification).
As far as the GC is concerned,Boom got 2 bonus seconds and he now has 5 seconds of advantage on Jens Voigt.After Voigt now there are Millar,LL Sanchez,Kreuziger and Henderson,who all improved their previous placement in the GC.All the other GC riders ended the race with 17" of delay from the stage winner.Between them there was also Frank Schleck,who came 68th.In his same group there were also Gustav Larsson,Laurent Didier and JJ Haedo.Chris Sorensen (123th) crossed the finish-line 4'53" after Henderson,whereas Richie Porte and Jakob Fuglsang arrived 7 minutes after the winner.
Tomorrow's stage should be similar to this one and it's supposed to suit sprinters. And now,since this post is over,I go back to Guy Fawkes,Robert Catesby,James I and all those nice guys-wish me good luck.
PS: On http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/team-schleck-in-2011-peloton there are the Schlecks' (predictable) answers to the rumours about a possible Team Schleck in 2011.
(Pic 1 by by Bettini,Pic 2 by AFP)
Guy Fawkes!
RispondiEliminaMy Logic tells me that Frank Schleck's TT result is not so bad, because he is more likely than most to have been bothered by the wind and the cobbles, and already rode one decent (for him) TT this season. But my Fangirl will be saying differently if he misses the podium by 30 seconds.
RispondiElimina@ Danielle: My Logic,who is often very pessimistic,thinks that you are probably right.After all,Frank isn't a great time trialist/bike driver,therefore,as you say, wind and cobbles have probably created more problems to him than to guys like Contador or Leipheimer :)
RispondiElimina@ Sansen: thank you for reminding me that right now I should be reading,and not using my computer.Logic appreciates :) Anyway I must admit that I'm finding the book interesting.In Italy the English history is studied in a very surperficial way,so I think it's a good thing to know a bit more about it.