Racing Tactics Come Into Play
Tour du Poitou-Charentes
Stage 5: Niort to Poitiers, 197.6km/123mi
By Cathy Mehl
Only the slimmest of margins separated Team RadioShack’s Markel Irizar and Martin Elminger (AG2R) after Markel’s stunning win in the time trial yesterday. With the race lead on the line, Team RadioShack knew Elminger would try for bonus seconds on course to take over the lead, and sure enough, it played out just like that in the beginning, putting Elminger in the virtual race lead and forcing his AG2R team to control the race. That’s when things went south for the Swiss rider.
“We expected that they would try to win the sprint at 16km,” explained Team Director Alain Gallopin. “But I was also sure that his team would not be able to control the race the remaining 180k and indeed that is what happened. After the sprint there were a lot of attacks, including Cervelo and ourselves before a group of eleven riders finally got away. This group included our Chechu Rubiera as well as a rider from Elminger’s team. But Chechu and that rider crashed. It was nothing serious but Chechu lost his place in the front group.”
With Chechu out of the front group, it was up to Ag2R to chase. “They looked to us but we refused and they lost the race. Elminger was mad at us but we ride for RadioShack, not AG2R,” concluded Gallopin.
In the front group Saur-Sojasun was well-represented and they gained more than two minutes advantage. The best-placed riders in the group were Jimmy Engoulvent and Dominique Rollin at 44 seconds from Elminger. Engoulvent attacked in the end with three others but was caught as his teammate Jimmy Casper took the sprint. Engoulvent moved into the leader’s jersey and took the overall win at the Tour du Poitou-Charentes. Haimar Zubeldia took fourth overall with Irizar just behind in fifth place.
Team RadioShack races on Sunday in the Châteauroux Classic de l'Indre with this same team that is currently riding in such great form. Good luck to the guys!
Top Ten Results
1 Jimmy CASPER Saur - Sojasun 4:22:20
2 Cédric PINEAU Roubaix Lille Metropole 0:00:00
3 Thibaut PINOT FDJ 0:00:00
4 Mathieu CLAUDE BBox Bouygues Telecom 0:00:03
5 Jimmy ENGOULVENT Saur - Sojasun 0:00:05
6 Dominique ROLLIN Cervélo Test Team 0:00:05
7 Kevin NEIRYNCK Landbouwkrediet 0:00:05
8 Tony HUREL BBox Bouygues Telecom 0:01:16
9 Wouter POELS Vacansoleil Pro Cycling Team 0:01:16
10 Danilo WYSS BMC Racing Team 0:01:17
Team RadioShack Results
12 Haimar ZUBELDIA 0:01:17
17 Markel IRIZAR 0:01:34
25 Geoffroy LEQUATRE 0:03:22
45 Fumiyuki BEPPU 0:03:26
50 Jesse SERGENT 0:03:26
DNF Sergio Miguel Moreira PAULINHO
DNF Yaroslav POPOVYCH
DNF José Luis RUBIERA
Final General Classification
1 Jimmy ENGOULVENT Saur - Sojasun 15:43:59
2 Dominique ROLLIN Cervélo Test Team 0:00:00
3 Martin ELMIGER AG2R - La mondiale 0:00:28
4 Haimar ZUBELDIA AGIRRE Team RadioShack 0:00:32
5 Markel IRIZAR ARRANBURU Team RadioShack 0:00:48
6 Jimmy CASPER Saur - Sojasun 0:00:50
7 Cédric PINEAU Roubaix Lille Metropole 0:01:01
8 Wouter POELS Vacansoleil Pro Cycling Team 0:01:03
9 Ignatas KONOVALOVAS Cervélo Test Team 0:01:05
10 Kevin NEIRYNCK Landbouwkrediet 0:01:07
Team RadioShack on Final General Classification
17 Jesse SERGENT 0:03:03
50 Fumiyuki BEPPU 0:07:39
51 Geoffroy LEQUATRE 0:07:47
Photos courtesy of Graham Watson
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