Six Days of Zürich

Switzerland, November 29 - December 4, 1999
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Night 1 - November 29th

Reported by Ernst Bretscher

The racing started on Monday evening at 19.00 (local time), with the first of eight amateur races. There followed the professionals at 20.05 and the stayers at 21.10 behind the heavy motors. The sprinters and dernys will start tomorrow.

There were a few changes to the starting list. Due to illness Franco Marvulli and Michael Sandstöd could not start, so a new number 5 team was formed: Etienne De Wilde/Tayeb Braikia. The amateurs have two changes: Number one, Marco Appler (Ger) in place of Riesenbeck, and number four Sven Epple (Ger) in place of Palicki.

This is the second time that the Zürich Six has been directed by Urs Freuler, the former six day rider with 31 wins, and 6 at Zürich). He is assisted by Walter Baumgartner, who is also a former track and road-cyclist - in 1984 he won the last Stage in the Tour de Suisse (ahead of Siegfried Hekimi and Urs Freuler). One final point, the "rides-kajutes" on the track are again in the wider north curve, not as was the case last year in the much smaller south curve. Last year the new Hallenstadion directors Béchir and Jenny made this change due to their inexperience in cycling-races, but this decision was a flop.

In the first night two Madison-Chases were ridden, the first one started after 8pm and was over 30 km. Gilmore/Mc Grory won the final sprint against Risi/Betschart, and all the other teams (3rd Martinello/Villa, 4th Llaneras/Galvez, 5th Baffi/Colinelli) lost one to four laps. The second Madison (over 40 km) ended 2 hours later, with three teams in front, and Martinello/Villa won ahead of Kappes/Madsen and Risi/Betschart.

In the overall the Swiss pair Risi/Betschart took the lead with one lap ahead of the three teams: Martinello/Villa, Gilmore/Mc Grory and Kappes/Madsen. The new Swiss Team, with Kammermann/Dunkel had a very hard first night and are in last place, 11 laps down. This is the first professional Six days ridden by the pair, after they won the amateur sixes at Zürich and Berlin last winter. Four other riders are also doing their first six day race of this winter, but they all have experience from last season. They are: Guido Fulst, Thorsten Rund (both Germany), Patrick Vetsch and Peter Jörg (both Switzerland).

Results: 

1. Bruno Risi/Kurt Betschart (Swi)            54 points

1 lap behind:
2. Silvio Martinello/Marco Villa (Ita)        58
3. Matthew Gilmore/Scott McGrory (Bel/Aus)    52
4. Andreas Kappes/Jimmy Madsen (Ger/Den)      50

2 laps behind:
5. Adriano Baffi/Andrea Collinelli (Ita)      41
6. Etienne de Wilde/Tayeb Braikia (Bel/Den)   28

3 laps behind:
7. Juan Llaneras/Isaac Galvez (Esp)           12
8. Frank Corvers/Laurenzo Lapage (Bel)         5

4 laps behind:
9. Christian Weber/Jens Lehmann (Swi/Ger)     28
10. Eric Weisspfennig/Stefan Steinweg (Ger)   12
11. Peter Jörg/Lars Teutenberg (Swi/Ger)      12

5 laps behind:
12. Rob Hayles/Bradley Wiggins (Gbr)          20
13. Mario Vonhof/Gerd Dörich (Ger)            10
14. Patrick Vetsch/Alexander Aeschbach (Swi)   9

6 laps behind:
15. Guido Fulst/Torsten Rund (Ger)            12

11 laps behind:
16. Markus Kammermann/Marcel Dunkel (Swi)      6

Amateurs:

The first of 8 stages of the amateur races was 30 km, won by the Slovak Team Liska/Zabka, who won a stage in last year's race. They won three of the five points sprints (including the last sprint) in the last 40 laps. 

1. Martin Liska/Josef Zabka (Cze/Slk)          17
2. Andre Kalfack/Marco Appler (Ger)            14
3. Carsten Wörner/Sven Epple (Ger)             10
4. Patrick Fäh/Marcel Pfister (Swi)            10
5. Luc De Duytsche/Nicky Vermeersch (Bel)       8
6. Gregor Gut/Beat Obrist (Swi)                 2
7. Patrick Banfi/Reto Lauper (Swi)              0
8. Jan Brunner/Philippe Weingartner (Swi)       0
9. Simon Ganz/Adrian Osterwalder (Swi)          0
10. Pascal Manser/Stefan Mittelhammer (Swi/Ger) 0

1 lap behind:
11. Ralph Zimmermann/Martial Heer (Swi)         0
12. Patrick Kraus/René Furrer (Swi)             0

2 laps behind:
13. Tobias Baumgartner/Michael Müller (Swi)     0

3 laps behind:
14. Michael Roth/Alexander Mattmann (Swi)       0

4 laps behind:
15. Philipp Dambach/Marco Hartmann (Swi)        0
16. Stefan Schär/Oliver Mattmann (Swi)          0

9 laps behind:
17. Michael Morf/Kevin Jäggi (Swi)              0

Stayers:

The first stage (called the prologue) of the stayers competition was won in a sprint by Swiss-Champion (and European-Champion of 1998) Hanskurt Brand. He beat in the winner of the last world championship at 1994 in Sicily, German Carsten Podlesch. He is still riding in his world-champion jersey. 

1. Hanskurt Brand/René Aebi (Swi)               1
2. Carsten Podlesch/Walrave (Ger)               2
3. Sabino Cannone/Durst (Ita)                   3
4. Felice Puttini/Roberto Puttini (Swi)         4
5. Ralf Keller/De Bakker (Ger)                  5
6. Christoph Göhring/Peter Steiger (Swi)        6
7. Lubomir Mazei/Baur (Cze)                     7
8. Roland Rol/Robert Buchmann (Swi)             8

Results courtesy of Pascal Meisser