Tour de France Team Talk Stage 6

Riccardo Ricco (Saunier Duval/Scott) out sprinted Alejandro Valverde (Caisse d'Epargne) and Cadel Evans (Silence Lotto) on top of the climb of Super Besse to win the sixth stage of the Tour de France - report

Kim Kirchen took race lead of the Tour de France on Thursday’s summit finish at Superbesse.

“It’s been an exceptionally good Tour for me and Team Columbia so far, I was holding the points jersey for several stages and now I’m in yellow.” Kirchen said. “I wanted to go for the stage win to take the yellow jersey but there was a strong headwind and then some late attacks and I got blocked so I couldn’t move ahead.” “In any case, I still ended up in the lead.”

“I was hoping that my form was going to be good but it’s even better than expected.” “I came here focused on getting the first stage win [finishing fourth], and got very close, but if that was a bit disappointing I made up with a great time trial, better than I expected, on stage four.”

“Now I have taken the yellow jersey of cycling’s biggest race, and everybody knows how special that is.”

Kirchen refused to rule out winning the Tour overall. “The Tour is the Tour: it’s very long and extremely tough. A lot depends on what happens in the Pyrenees. If I can stay with the climbers there, then I’ll start thinking about taking the yellow jersey in the Alps.”

Damiano Cunego lost time to his main rivals on the final climb -: “I knew that this was a dangerous stage, characterised by tough 1500 meters after a climb on which the speed was high. I’m sorry for not being at the head of the race in the final, but I was tired: at mid-race I understood that today was not such a good day for my legs, so I tried to keep hard and to defend."

"Thirty-two seconds are not so many, but of course I would prefer not to have lost them. I want to think positive and to focus my attention on the other tough stages, during which I want to be competitive”.

Cunego reached the arrival in 29th position at 32” from Riccò and Valverde (2nd), 28” from Frank Schleck, 25” from Sastre and Menchov. The overall standing is led by Kirchen, while Cunego is 14th at 1’42”.

“It’s not a good thing having lost these seconds, but this doesn’t compromise Damiano's Tour – Piovani, Lampre’s sport director, said – Cunego knows that his fit is going to increase, so we think he would be competitive in the next stages and until Paris.”

Kim Kirchen seemingly caused Stefan Schumacher, the race leader, to crash in the final moments of the stage and the German summed it up nicely - "It's was like a bad movie for me".

Moises Duenas rode to seventh, just 7 seconds behind Ricco, "I was feeling good, and I could easily stay with the favorites on the final climb. Today's placement is ok, now I am looking to improve it and keep doing well in the hardest stages". And also team manager Claudio Corti was satisfied with the Spaniard rider: "It's not a surprise Moises has rode well today. He was expected to be strong on the mountain and he didn't let me down".

Christian Knees lost time in the final 500 metres, but he still improved his placing on General Classification.

"Despite back and seat problems, I was in the front for a long time and saw that I could keep up,“ said Christian Knees. "Marco and Erik supported me until the foot of the last climb. I was able to improve my standing in the overall classification, and I’m generally happy with how the stage went.“

"It was a hard race with lots of gradient and the expectedly exciting finale“, said DS Jochen Hahn, "Christian looked good as he measured himself with the others. We are absolutely satisfied with his performance. He’s ranked 20th on the overall and that’s all according to plan.

Riccardo Ricco had targeted this stage win and he proved that he can match deeds with words - "I wanted to win a stage and I achieved my goal as early as the sixth stage. Now I'll take the race day by day."

“With 300 meters to go I saw Valverde easing up and insist that someone else come through for a turn. That was the right moment to attack."

Ricco is now thinking about his next goal at this Tour - a podium?

Aurelien Passeron quit the race and joined team mate Angel Gomez as an abandon. Passeron had hit a spectator the previous day.

Christian Vandevelde launched a big attack on Super Besse and he said - "It gave me confidence. Attacking like that is way out of my character. I am a conservative rider and that was anything but. I would’ve surely finished with the leaders today, but I risked it all for a chance at the yellow jersey for either Dave or myself. The Tour is long though, and even though I spent some energy in the final today, it gives me confidence for the future."

Fränk Schleck took a fourth place - "All in all a good stage for us. We managed to confirm that our GC riders are on form so that was very positive. It was too bad that Andy lost time on something which could've been avoided and which wasn't his fault but that can't be helped – that's cycling for you," said sports director Kim Andersen.

Injured Nicki Sørensen got through the stage ok. His knee even felt better towards the end so that's great news and gives us hope that he'll be back one hundred percent in another few stages.

Andy Schelck lost time when Stefan Schumacher (Gerolsteiner) crashed and as a result he was boxed in, which cost Andy about 30 seconds.

Herve Duclos Lassalle, Cofidis - stage 1
Angel Gomez, Saunier Duval - stage 3
Maurico Soler, Barloworld - stage 5
Aurelien Passeron, Saunier Duval - stage 6

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