Brajkovic Goes on the Attack, Zubeldia Fractures Wrist
Critérium du Dauphiné
Stage 1: Evian-les-Bains to Saint-Laurent-du-Pont, 191 km/119mi
By Cathy Mehl
A late-race attack by Team RadioShack’s Jani Brajkovic made for exciting racing in the first stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné. Jani put in a strong effort with 5km to go on the descent of the final climb and rode away from the peloton. His showed stellar bike-handling skills on the descent and built a sizable gap to the chasers. With 1500m to go Jani was joined by Eros Capecchi (Footon-Servetto) and the two worked momentarily to stay away, but the motivations were high from the sprinters with the front peloton coming together in the last 400 meters. Brajkovic’s training partner Grega Bole (Lampre) just nipped Peter Velits (HTC-Columbia) on the line, with third place going to Geraint Thomas of Team Sky. Alberto Contador (Astana) retained his yellow jersey and still holds two seconds over Tejay Van Garderen (HTC-Columbia) and another three-seconds over Jani.
A big crash near 15km to go took down a large number of riders, including The Shack’s Markel Irizar, Haimar Zubeldia,Geoffroy Lequatre and Ben Hermans. Markel and Ben both developed hematomas, with Hermans also injuring his face and suffering from headaches. But worse was Haimar, who injured his hand and had to go to the hospital after the race to have x-rays and the results showed a fractured wrist for our Basque rider, a big loss indeed to the team. UPDATE: Some hours after the race, Zubeldia underwent surgery in the Centre Hospitalier of Voiron (France). The doctors inserted a plate to stabilize the fracture and to ensure a quick recovery. Zubeldia, one of Team RadioShack’s key riders for the Grand Tours can continue training, thanks to the medical intervention, but right now it is not possible to determine when he will be able to resume competition.
Four ranked climbs and plenty of sunshine were on tap for the peloton of 175 riders. An early break of five riders included Biel Kadri (Ag2R), Cyril Gautier (Bbox), Dominique Rollin (Cervelo), Sebastien Minard (Cofidis) and Matthieu Ladagnous (FdJ). The quintet reached a high mark of almost ten minutes before Astana put in some effort to protect the race lead of Contador. By the final climb it was Garmin doing the bulk of the work to bring back the leaders, with American Danny Pate ramping up the speed of the chasers. By 10km to go the gap was at 40-seconds and once the pitch went up the breakaway was absorbed, setting up Jani’s big attack.
Tuesday’s Stage 2 rolls the peloton 177km from Annonay to Bourg-Saint-Andéol and has a final climb more than 50km from the finish which should set up another sprint finish.
Sergio leads the chase
Top Ten Results
1 Grega Bole (Slo) Lampre-Farnese Vini 4:47:24
2 Peter Velits (Svk) Team HTC - Columbia
3 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team
4 Steve Chainel (Fra) Bbox Bouygues Telecom
5 Christophe Riblon (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale
6 Christian Knees (Ger) Team Milram
7 Stefan Denifl (Aut) Cervelo Test Team
8 Maxime Bouet (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale
9 Arkaitz Duran Daroca (Spa) Footon-Servetto
10 Julien El Farès (Fra) Cofidis, le Credit en Ligne
Team RadioShack Results
32 Christopher Horner (USA)
34 Jani Brajkovic (Slo)
161 Tomas Vaitkus (Ltu) 0:07:03
162 Geoffroy Lequatre (Fra)
163 Sergio Miguel Moreira Paulinho (Por)
164 Haimar Zubeldia Aguirre (Spa)
166 Ben Hermans (Bel) 0:10:02
169 Markel Irizar Aranburu (Spa) 0:11:56
General Classification after Stage 1
1 Alberto Contador Velasco (Spa) Astana 4:55:58
2 Tejay Van Garderen (USA) Team HTC - Columbia 0:00:02
3 Jani Brajkovic (Slo) Team Radioshack 0:00:05
4 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Professional Cycling Team 0:00:10
5 Dario Cataldo (Ita) Quick Step 0:00:12
6 Rémi Pauriol (Fra) Cofidis, le Credit en Ligne
7 Jérôme Coppel (Fra) Saur - Sojasun 0:00:14
8 Christophe Riblon (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale
9 Gorka Verdugo Marcotegui (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi 0:00:15
10 David Millar (GBr) Garmin – Transitions
Team RadioShack on General Classification
16 Christopher Horner (USA) 0:00:18
161 Haimar Zubeldia Aguirre (Spa) 0:07:21
162 Sergio Miguel Moreira Paulinho (Por) 0:07:40
164 Tomas Vaitkus (Ltu) 0:07:42
165 Geoffroy Lequatre (Fra) 0:07:51
166 Ben Hermans (Bel) 0:10:19
169 Markel Irizar Aranburu (Spa) 0:12:26
Photos courtesy of Graham Watson
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