Team Talk - weekend report 1

We catch up with the action and events over the March 15/16 Weekend

A busy weekend bought mixed success for the teams as they raced, Tirreno-Adriatico and Paris Nice. Plus controversy was never far away.

Paris Nice closed on March 16 with the General Classification going to Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner), where there were stage wins for Thor Hushovd in the prologue, Gert Steegman's on stages one and two, followed by wins for Kjell Carlstrom, Cadel Evans on Mount Ventoux, Carlos Barredo, Sylvain Chavanel and finally Luis Leon Sanchez.

The last stage of Tirreno-Adriatico is on Tuesday, March 18, offering the riders plenty of time to recover for Milan San Remo, and riders likely to feature in the first of the Spring Classics, have featured strongly.

Stage one went to Oscar Freire, Raffaele Illiano on stage 2, then Joachim Rodriguez, Alessandro Petacchi and on Sunday Fabian Cancellara.

Controversy was sparked when Kevin Van Impe was subjected to a drugs test in Belgium when he was arranging the funeral of his newly born son, and this sparked a rider protest at the start of Sunday's Paris Nice stage.

More sparks will fly later in the year because the Tour de France organisers (ASO) stated at the weekend that they would chose 2008 teams this week and would hold the event outside of the UCI.

World Championships
In Between Tirreno-Adriatico and Milan San Remo, Paulo Bettini and Tom Boonen intend to check over the World Road Race Championship course at Varese, Italy. Bettini commentated; "Our season is so full of competitions that we have little time, if we don’t go and preview the Varese route now I doubt we’ll have another chance before the championship week itself”.

Milram
Alessandro Petacchi is busy going toe to toe with Oscar Friere at Tirreno-Adriatico, losing out on stage one but winning at stage four, Pettacchi told us; "My thanks go to my team mates, who led me into a perfect position in the finale. Especially Erik Zabel has given me support on the last metres,” "“Things were a bit tense on the final climb before the finish, but the Milram express once more did a great job.”

The “Race to the Sun” turned out to be a “Tour of Torture” for Team Milram. The German ProTour team had been plagued by crashes, and so only five of its eight riders made it to the finish line. Several crashes on wet roads during the second stage had robbed the German ProTour team early on of any chance to place well in the general classification and forced Christian Knees of Bornheim and his team mates Sergio Ghisalberti und Andrey Grivko to abandon the race in the course of the following stages. "Our riders have demonstrated great morale,” said Raoul Liebregts, directeur sportif.. “After numerous crashes in the first days of the race, our morale was really down. The team hotel looked like a hospital. Six riders were under the weather and battled their way through to the finish day by day. We all take our hats off to that fighting spirit!”

Quickstep
Quickstep had a great Paris Nice with Carlos Barredo winning stage 5 and wants to win the Tour of Flanders. He said “This is my first victory wearing the Quick Step jersey". "I love the classic races and one-day races, but it seems like I also do pretty well in stage races too – lets not forget my 10th place in the 2007 Vuelta Espana. My dream? Well, I’m sure it will seem strange for a Spaniard like myself, but I’d love to win the Flanders”.

Team Manager, Patrick Lefevere was very please with Paris Nice; “We’ll remember this race for a long time. the guys were fantastic. We won 3 stages, two thanks to Steegmans and one thanks to Barredo. We were also protagonists each day of the race in all of the important actions. I am really pleased and proud of our results”.

Meanwhile in Tirreno-Adriatico, things were not so good. Stijn Devolder said; “During the first and most difficult part of the race at Montelupone I was forced to put my foot on the ground due to a small group of fallers in front of me and I lost the chance of keeping up with the leading group. That said, it wasn’t a very good day overall today – my legs just weren’t pedalling wel!. Maybe I should have managed to keep with the lead group but I certainly wouldn’t have won the stage. It’s a shame. I’ll be trying my all for a victory at Sunday’s timed stage." During the stage Tom Boonen crashed without consequences.

During Sunday's time trial Paolo Bettini had a scary moment when he found himself with a car heading towards him after a left hand corner coming down from the town of Macerata. More than likely the vehicle came out of a private drive on to the race route. “I was very lucky – Bettini said - If I had met that car just the bend before where visibility was poor, I don’t think I’d be here telling you about it! I don’t want to blame anyone but things like this really shouldn’t happen”.

Rabobank
Rabobank suffered a black day in the Tirreno-Adriatico on stage three. Joost Posthuma and Oscar Freire, both crashed. Team Manager Erik Breukink said on the team website about the race; "The men did really try to make something out of it. But, after losing Joost Posthuma, we no longer had a specialist. You just don't play a role anymore then. It is a shame," judged Breukink, who did express his mood of disappointment on Sunday in regards to Posthuma's absence. "When I saw the track's profile, his abandonment was additionally bitter. This was a beautiful track for time trial riders. I would have liked to see Joost take on world-class riders here."

At Paris Nice Rabobank's Robert Geesenk had been leading overall, but lost out as the race developed. Team leader Erik Dekker said; "He has to be disappointed. Obviously, it is very tough to lose your jersey in the final descent of the last-but-one stage. There are people who experience bad nights of sleep because of things that are less worse. We basically did not make a lot of mistakes. Nobody could have helped him during the descent. A terrible descent it is; I can tell that from my own experience. Robert stood no chance after they had found each other in the front ranks on the flat roads." It will be difficult to surprise Rebellin, Nocentini, and Popovych. Bram Tankink had to pull himself out of the race due to knee problems, which he sustained in the first stage.

Team CSC
Writing on the CSC website Fabian Cancellera commentated on his Tirreno-Adriatico stage win on Sunday, March 16 ”I was really fired up at the prospect of taking the jersey, but I knew it would take more than just winning the stage. Everything turned out perfectly and it was a great victory right now both for me and the team. Tomorrow's stage is tough, but if we can keep everything tight there's a good chance of us winning the race. My primary goal here was to prepare for the classics, but I'm also meant to win if the opportunity comes along and of course I saw my chance here, because I've been able to keep up on the climbs as well as I have. I haven't been under any pressure or stress, but today's main objective was to snatch that jersey and now of course we'll try and hang on to it. Winning Tirreno-Adriatico would be an excellent opening to the classics for all of us,” said a happy Fabian Cancellara after his third victory in 2008.

And finally..

Slipstream
Team leader Jonathan Vaughters writes on the team website. "So, obviously, Paris-Nice did not go so great for us. But I gotta say, what a great race! It had everything I love about cycling. Changing leaders, unpredictability, suffering. It was completely non-mechanical and could have been won or lost all the way to the last 20 meters of the race.

In the end, a top young talent (Gesink) was out maneuvered by some veterans. It could have gone any number of ways. None of which would make me scratch my head and think, “This is a bit boring.”

Unpredictable racing is really encouraging to see. It’s a sign that younger riders have a lot to look forward to in their careers, as opposed to dread. Fans too have got to love this type of racing. It reminds me of the ‘87 Tour when the race lead changed who knows how many times. Guys blew up one day, but attacked the next. Really great stuff - and really human."