GP Weltour - 1.5

Poland, May 1, 2001

2000 Results    Results    Past winners

The day of the Digger

By Grzesiek Kaczmarzyk

Piotr Przydzial won the GP Weltour - Szosami Zaglebia. The cyclist of the Polish team CCC MAT, called Digger by his friends, rode the last 50 km of the race alone. He finished the race almost three minutes in front of the second rider.

"Piotr is very fit at the moment. He is almost half a class higher than the others. Everybody was afraid of him today," said Grzegorz Gronkiewicz (Weltour) afterwards.

"The Digger was the strongest today," added Slawomir Chrzanowski who won the race for second place.

The route started in Sosnowiec. Then, the cyclists rode to Lazy where they had eight 15 kilometre laps. At the halfway point of each lap, they climbed Stodolsko Mountain (425 m., 1.5 km at 5%). After these laps, the riders finished in Bedzin. In July, the Polish championships are going to take place on the same route.

Przydzial, who won the Tour de Pologne last year, attacked for the first time after 40 kilometres. "I just wanted to test my leg to see whether it worked properly," he said. He attacked for the second time on the 6th lap.

After some time, two riders: Chrzanowski and Slovakian Jan Valach caught him. "But Chrzanowski didn't want to cooperate in this escape, so the Digger left them and it was over," said Andrzej Sypytkowski, the team menager of CCC MAT. "I told myself to try three times and the third one was successful," Przydzial adeed.

After that, the managers of the other teams think that Przydzial is a big chance to win the Peace Race.

Results - 180 km

1 Piotr Przydzial (Pol) CCC MAT           4.19.40 (41.59 km/h)
2 Slawomir Chrzanowski (Pol) Weltour         2.40
3 Jan Valach (Svk) De Nardi                  2.42
4 Petr Herman (Cze) PSK Remerx               5.09
5 Krzysztof Jezowski (Pol) Mikomax
6 Marcin Gebka (Pol) CCC MAT
7 Hubert Nowak (Pol) Legia Bazyliszek
8 Wojciech Pawlak (Pol) Atlas Lukullus       5.13
9 Czeslaw Lukaszewicz (Pol) Servisco
10 Marek Kaminski (Pol) Servisco 
14 Radek Dite (Cze) PSK Remerx
20 Lubos Kejval (Cze) PSK Remerx
30 Marian Hajzler (Cze) PSK Remerx
 
Courtesy of Grzesiek Kaczmarzyk/Tomas Svoboda

Past Winners

2000 Jacek Mickiewicz (Pol) Mróz-Supradyn