First Edition Cycling News for April 9, 2005Edited by John Stevenson Paris-Roubaix to be harder than before - O'Grady
With podium places in Milan San Remo and the Tour of Flanders on his palmares, Stuart O'Grady is Australia's best Classics rider. With two days to go to Paris-Roubaix, O'Grady told Gerard Knapp just how much he's looking forward to this year's 260km of cobbles and mud. Despite the removal of what was considered the most dangerous section of cobbles on the Paris-Roubaix parcours - the dreaded Forêt d'Arenberg - the lead rider for French team Cofidis, Stuart O'Grady, believes Sunday's epic race could actually be harder without the famously-brutal section. After checking out the new sections of the parcours that organizers have added to replace Arenberg, the Australian expects the race to have a different level of intensity. "Before you could feel the race would chill out a bit (after Arenberg), as the race would then enter good sections of asphalt, they would take in some food and drinks and then prepare for the next section. But now, they've replaced it with absolute goat-tracks, it's constantly twisting left and right; there just no place to recover," he said. "It's just going to be full-on." Click here for the full interview. Discovery finalises Roubaix line-up - with HammondLast year's third-placed rider Roger Hammond will start this year's Paris-Roubaix despite a broken thumb sustained in Wednesday's Gent-Wevelgem, his Discovery Channel team has confirmed. Hammond hit a metal traffic pole in one of the many crashes that marred this year's Gent-Wevelgem, spraining his ankle and bruising his knee as well as breaking his thumb. A broken thumb might sound like a show-stopper faced with the bike-control issues the mud and cobbles of Paris-Roubaix throw up, but it was actually the knee and ankle injuries that came closest to keeping the British champion from lining up on Sunday. On Thursday the pain in his ankle was debilitating, Hammond said on the Discovery Channel's website thepaceline.com. Hammond said he woke up on Thursday and the pain in his ankle was much worse. "Thursday I could hardly walk and thought 'this was it, there's no way,'" he said. "I really didn't want to go out training on the bike. It seems if I did then I would really know it wouldn't be possible to race on Sunday. But my parents were here and they encouraged me to go out and when I did, [the ankle and knee] got better and better. The finger can be dealt with differently, as you can isolate it in a plastic cast. With the ankle and knee, Dr. Dag [van Elslande, the team's physician] didn't want to me injure it any further." Hammond will be taking it easy until Sunday, not practising on the course to avoid hammering his injured thumb. "The most important thing for me is not to tighten up," he said. "With my hand, I'm just going to have to be lucky in the race, with all the shaking that will happen from the roads." Meanwhile Discovery directeur sportif Dirk Demol - himself a Paris-Roubaix winner, in 1988 - has been checking out the new course with members of the team that will race on Sunday. "It was good to see the changes they have made to the course," he said. "The changes have made the race harder compared to last year. We all thought the hardest part was out when they took away the Arenberg forest but of the 5-6 new (cobble) sections, two are very hard - both are up and down, not dead flat at all. It was good to see that." Discovery Channel for Paris-Roubaix: Michael Barry, Tony Cruz, Stijn Devolder, Viatcheslav Ekimov, Roger Hammond, Ryder Hesjedal, George Hincapie, Leif Hoste New sections worse - KnavenWinner of Paris-Roubaix in 2001, Quick.Step's Servais Knaven is one of many riders who have been reconnoitering the Paris-Roubaix parcours in the last few days. On his website, Knaven notes that there have been changes to the course from previous years, such as the removal of the Arenberg Forest for safety reasons. "But I have to say that some of the new sections are worse," writes Knaven. "The cobbles are not only badly laid, but there is a lot of mud on them." Quick.Step has confirmed that its line-up for Paris-Roubaix will be Tom Boonen, Wilfried Cretskens, Kevin Hulsmans, Servais Knaven, Nick Nuyens, Filippo Pozzato, Bram Tankink, and Guido Trenti. Voeckler "disappointed" by season so farBy his own admission, Bouygues Telecom's Thomas Voeckler has not had a great season so far. The 25-year-old Frenchman shot to fame when he wore the yellow jersey in last year's Tour de France, and captured hearts worldwide as he battled to hang on to it when the race hit the mountains. It's happened in the past that riders have shone in yellow and slipped back into obscurity afterwards. Voeckler seems determined not to let that happen to him, but to demonstrate that last year's stint in yellow was no fluke, he needs results. So far, they have been slow in coming. "I am really not satisfied," Voeckler told l'Equipe. "My results are not at the moment at the high level I'd hoped for. More than ever before, people are expecting a lot of me this season. I did not do too badly at Het Volk and GP E3 Harelbeck and I was even among the protagonists, but the Tour of Flanders was a real disappointment. I had to abandon." Voeckler acquitted himself competently at the year's first stage race, Paris-Nice, but even that's no consolation. "I would have liked to strike a blow. It's always better to win a stage than to finish 18th on general classification. I hope that will come, but I am just not the guy for the early season." Voeckler will ride Paris-Roubaix this weekend. He acknowledges it's place in cycling's mythology, but it's not a race where he expects to perform at his best. "This race is part of the heritage of cycling. I have a lot of respect for the racers that have shone in Paris-Roubaix. For my part I go there with a lot of hunger, with the intention of making a good showing. The one thing that scares me is the rain, though. I am not one of the acrobats of the pave." Voeckler intends to hang in there till the first sections of pave and then try and escape from the peloton with the contenders, but admits, "I a race like this, I am not able to figure in the finale. I do not have enough "oomph" to follow a rider such as Tom Boonen. He is younger than me but stronger." Petacchi still leads ProTour after PVFollowing the Vuelta al Pais Vasco, the sixth round of the UCI ProTour, Alessandro Petacchi (Fassa Bortolo) remains on top of the rankings with 93 points. The winner of Milan-San Remo has kept his buffer over Oscar Freire (Rabobank, 78 pts) and Bobby Julich (CSC, 75 pts), although the latter moved up the rankings thanks to his fifth place overall in Pais Vasco. Ronde van Vlaanderen winner Tom Boonen (Quick.Step) is in fifth place on 62 points, and he has a chance to score enough points in Paris-Roubaix to move him into the lead. In the teams rankings, Fassa Bortolo is the top team on 92 points, ahead of consistent performers Davitamon-Lotto and Rabobank on 87 points. Italy is back to its usual number one spot on the nations rankings with 245 points, ahead of Spain (222 pts), Germany (201 pts) and Belgium (164 pts). ProTour Rankings as of April 8, 2005Individuals 1 Alessandro Petacchi (Ita) Fassa Bortolo 93 pts 2 Oscar Freire Gomez (Spa) Rabobank 78 3 Bobby Julich (USA) Team CSC 75 4 Danilo Hondo (Ger) Gerolsteiner 70 5 Tom Boonen (Bel) Quick Step 62 6 Danilo Di Luca (Ita) Liquigas-Bianchi 51 7 Thor Hushovd (Nor) Credit Agricole 50 8 Alejandro Valverde Belmonte (Spa) Illes Balears-Caisse d'Epargne 43 9 Davide Rebellin (Ita) Gerolsteiner 41 10 Andreas Klier (Ger) T-Mobile Team 41 Teams 1 Fassa Bortolo 92 pts 2 Davitamon-Lotto 87 3 Rabobank 87 4 T-Mobile Team 85 5 Team CSC 82 6 Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team 70 7 Phonak Hearing Systems 69 8 Saunier Duval-Prodir 68 9 Liberty Seguros-Würth Team 61 10 Quick Step 58 Nations 1 Italy 245 pts 2 Spain 222 3 Germany 201 4 Belgium 164 5 United States Of America 110 6 Australia 62 7 Norway 50 8 Switzerland 31 9 France 31 10 Netherlands 27 Full rankings: ProTour, Teams, Nations Off Road to Athens to premiere at Sea OtterOff Road to Athens, a documentary following the progress of eight US mountain bike racers as they attempt to qualify for the 2004 Olympic Games, will have its world premiere at the Sea Otter Classic next weekend. All eight of the riders followed in the film will attend the first screening at the Golden State Theater in downtown Monterey, California on Friday April 15 at 7pm. There will be another screening at the same time and location on Saturday April 16. The film follows the eight riders as they criss-cross the globe in 2003 and 2004 in search of UCI points to meet the Olympic selection criteria. Only three spots were available for US mountain bikers at Athens, and the went to the riders highest on the UCI rankings on July 12, 2004, forcing contenders into a year of frantic globe-trotting that took riders who usually concentrate on the US circuit to Scotland, Belgium, Malta and Canada. For more information and a trailer, see www.offroadtoathens.com. Madrid plans Olympic stadium TT start/finishMadrid's 2012 Olympic bid isn't considered a favourite with London, Paris and New York currently the front runners in the race to host the Games seven years hence. But Madrid organizers have come up with an idea that UCI officials have called "brilliant": host the start and finish of the time trial in the Olympic Stadium. According to gamesbids.com, Madrid plans to run its time trial August 12, early in the Games and before the athletics program gets underway. That would free up the 70,000-seat stadium for the start and finish of the time trial, an idea lauded by two UCI executives who have been visiting Madrid to examine the cycling aspects of its bid. The UCI representatives also said they were satisfied with other aspects of Madrid's bid, such as the velodrome and BMX track. Fort Lewis hosts SquawkerFort Lewis College's Cycling Team, will host the annual Squawker Classic on April 16th and 17th. The weekend's races will consist of a team time trial, a criterium, and a road race. Collegiate athletes will be racing for points towards the Rocky Mountain Conference Championships and qualification for Nationals which are in May at Kansas University. Spring Classics Fantasy Game Paris-Roubaix update
The start list for the Paris - Roubaix on Sun 10th April has been uploaded to the game site. Here's what the manager of the winning team "Fightersss" in the Ronde Vlaanderen race said about how he picked his team. "I picked my team around Boonen, Van Petegem and Hincapie, which I thought would be three sure top 5 performers. Then I picked a few in-shape guys like Klier and Ballan that had performed well in E3 Prijs Vlaanderen and 3 Days of De Panne. After that I just watched the race and hoped for the best!" Pick your riders now! Enter your team now to win one of the prizes in this year's Fantasy Spring Classics game: Grand Prize: Specialized Roubaix bicycle equipped with Shimano Dura-Ace 10-speed groupset worth US$4400 Runner Up Prizes: Per Classic Prizes: 6 Specialized Decibel helmets worth $169 USD each New Features
JoiningIt's not too late to join in, you have every chance of winning one of the "prizes per classic" and are still eligible for the Grand prize of a Specialized Roubaix bicycle equipped with Shimano Dura-Ace 10-speed groupset worth US$4400, and runner up prizes. All you need to do to take part in this, the latest of the Fantasy Games at Cyclingnews, is register and select 8 riders for just a few, or all of the following races: Paris - Roubaix - April 10 As a manager you will have 4000 UCI points to purchase your riders for each race. There are ~250 riders in each official start list to choose from. Make your choice wisely as expensive riders don't always score the highest points for the team. The first 15 riders to finish each race will score points for your team. Have a look at the rules for more information. To register your teams for the game go to fantasy.cyclingnews.com. It's a great way to follow the Spring Classics! (All rights reserved/Copyright Knapp Communications Pty Limited 2005) |
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