Tour de France Team Talk Stage 9

Riccardo Ricco (Saunier Duval/Scott) wins the first Pyrenean mountain stage from Vladimir Efimkin (AG2R) at 1.106 and the pack at 1.20, which included all the main Tour contenders. - report

“Today was a key stage for the tour as it’s the first time the race hits the long climbs,” said Team Director Rolf Aldag. “We’re happy with the way the race went for us and that Kim was able to hold on to the yellow jersey.”

“Tomorrow will also be a hard day as we head further into the Pyrenees and over Col du Tourmalet and Hautacam. It is probably one of the toughest days of the Tour.”

Lampre think the first big mountain test in the Pyrenees went well for Damiano Cunego. “Today I’m satisfied, I had good feelings – Cunego commented – My condition can increase, but today I’ve already pedaled in a good way on Peyresourde and Aspin. During the stage there was no real battle among the main riders, but today it will be different: I think that it will be a very tough stage and there will battle. We’ll see if my feelings will be good tomorrow too”.

Riccardo Ricco won his second stage of the 2008 Tour de France and once more did it with some panache. "I´m so very happy. This triumph´s been great. I´d like to thank my teammates for their great job. My special thanks goes to Piepoli, whose help in the last climb was decisive. I wasn´t planning to charge, but I felt fine, so I decided to crank up the pace and then I just couldn´t stop before cresting the Aspin. Climbing down involved some technical difficulties at the beginning, but then it was just a matter of pedaling hard. I was tired, but I sort of time-trialed it to the finish line. I´m not thinking of the GC."

"I know I can´t win the Tour. You have to be ready for it, train like other riders have done. My goal was scoring a stage win and it´d been accomplished. What happened today was completely unexpected; it took even me by surprise. I won´t give up, however, and I´ll score more wins if I can. Tomorrow I´d like to work for Piepoli, for the race to Hautacam is perfect for him. As I´ve been saying all along, I´m here to gain experience this year, so that I can come back in 2009 for the overall lead."

David de la Fuente leads the King of he Mountains competition - "One day more in polka dots, that´s more than I could dream of. More importantly, I keep earning points. I was so close to riding into the key breakaway in the early kilometres. We built a gap of 30" but were eventually caught. I gave it the full gas in Col d´Aspin, and I managed to keep the jersey by being fourth. The only thing I need now is a bed: I have to replenish my energy reserves for stage 10 tomorrow, which is incredibly tough."

DS Joxean Fernández said - "Today´s a historic day for the team and for the Tour. Riccò´s feat will be remembered for many years. This triumph shows that, being only 24, he´s ready for big things. The boys were great: five of them were in the leading bunch, and they defended De la Fuente´s KOM jersey, bringing Riccardo into the fight too. Now we´ll try to do even better. It´s been so difficult for this team to score our first stage win, that now there´s no stopping us."

With the team lacking Maurico Soler, they are left to look for good each stage, this time team manager Corti considered young Kenyan rider Chris Froome's day. "When the riders passed atop the Aspin - Corti explained - Chris Froome was at the back of the peloton, so he lost some seconds he was not able to recover anymore. But it is a matter of experience: still we are very happy with his performance, and with the rider he is developing into" .

Christian Knees said - "I am completely satisfied with my fifth place today. It was a bit difficult for me on the first mountain but Peter Velits supported me really well. After the descent, Erik Zabel and Marco Velo came back on us and supplied us with water bottles. In the finale, I rode very attentively, took a good back wheel and achieved a good result.”

"For me, it was a great day. I feel very well after my first big Tour de France mountain stage“, said Peter Velits. "I wasn’t sure how it would go for me before the stage. The first mountain was not a problem; the second was a bit harder because there were many attacks. Christian and I had to let go shortly at the end of the climb but we fought our way back in the descent.”

Björn Schröder tried an early move but soon had him back amongst them. otherwise it was a question of survival fro sprinter Erik Zabel.

Andy Schleck now wears the white jersey of best young rider - "I'm happy that I get to wear the White Jersey but it wasn't something, which was on my mind out there. Today was all about trying to stay up front for me. In some weird way I'm actually a bit sad to have taken it from Thomas Lövkvist (Team Columbia) because he's a really good friend of mine, but such is life, I guess. Last year I got the jersey in the ninth stage of Giro d'Italia as well and kept it all the way through to the last stage, so I'm hoping to do the same here," said Andy Schleck after the stage.

"It was a fairly exciting stage today. It wasn't as tough as we'd anticipated, but it's not unlikely that some of the riders in the peloton might be a bit worn out tomorrow, where we have a more important stage ahead of us. Tourmalet and Hautacam are climbs of an entirely different caliber than those today so we're going to be much more aggressive tomorrow," said Bjarne Riis.

In the overall standings Carlos Sastre advanced to a 10th place followed in the next two spots by Fränk and Andy Schleck.

Cadel Evans crashed heavily and finished with the main contenders for overall victory. Team doctor Jan Mathieu checked his injuries. Cadel is bruised from the head to the leg and his broken crash helmet shows how brutal the fall had been.

He will ride on.

You can some nicely cheesy films about Cadle at - http://www.yellforcadel.com/

Herve Duclos Lassalle, Cofidis - stage 1 - crash
Angel Gomez, Saunier Duval - stage 3 - crash
Maurico Soler, Barloworld - stage 5 - injuries from an earlier crash
Aurelien Passeron, Saunier Duval - stage 6 - failed to start (Hit a spectator the previous day)
Magnus Backstedt, Garmin Chipotle - stage 7 - outside time limit
Lilian Jegou, FD Jeux - stage 7 - crash
Christophe Moreau, Agritubel - stage 7, bad back
John Gadret, AG2R - stage 7
Mauro Facci, Quickstep, - stage 7
Manuel Beltran, Liquigas - stage 7 - withdrawn before start after positive dope test

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