Thousands of fans lined the streets of downtown St. Louis to watch Team Garmin-Chipotle’s Christian Vande Velde cross the finish line safely and win the 2008 Tour of Missouri. Vande Velde, winner of Stage Three’s Individual Time Trial, was awarded the Missouri Tourism Yellow Jersey for the race after successfully maintaining an 18-second lead over Michael Rogers of Team Columbia who finished second in the General Classification. Svein Tuft of Symmetrics rounded out the podium in third place.

“It’s been a really great race from day one,” said Vande Velde, who finished fifth in the 2008 Tour de France. “I didn’t expect to win the time trial, but from then on, it was game on with everyone throwing everything at us, trying to take away the 21-second gap I had from the time trial. In the end, I was happy that everyone gave us such a fight because the win means that much more to us.”

Read the rest of this entry »

With less than 500 meters from the finish, Mark Cavendish of Team Columbia powered passed a hard charging group of riders to win Stage Six of the Tour of Missouri. Cavendish’s win was his third and Team Columbia’s fourth of the Tour. Cuban sprinter Ivan Dominguez of Toyota-United Pro Cycling, winner of two stages during last year’s Tour of Missouri, finished in second place and Jelly Belly’s Brad Huff of Springfield, Mo., finished third.

Mark Cavendish (Columbia) wins the sprint ahead of Ivan Dominguez (Toyota-United) and Brad Huff (Jelly Belly)

“I’m really fortunate to have such strong guys working so selflessly for me. They do it every time and I’m glad I can repay them with a win every time,” said Cavendish of his Columbia teammates. The young British sprinter won four stages in this year’s Tour de France.

With the mass finish, there were no significant changes to the General Classification standings with Christian Vande Velde of Team Garmin-Chipotle holding on to the Missouri Tourism Leader’s jersey going into Stage Seven. Vande Velde and his Garmin-Chipotle team will look to protect his 18-second lead over Michael Rogers of Team Columbia. Svein Tuft of Symmetrics remains in third place. Other notable Americans in the G.C. top ten include 2007 Tour of Missouri winner George Hincapie of Team Columbia in fourth place, Vande Velde’s teammate Tom Danielson in fifth place and Jeff Louder of BMC in eighth place.

Riders began Stage Six of the Tour in the Bavarian-Style town of Hermann at 12:30 p.m. The race for the Edward Jones Sprint Points Jersey took center stage as Eric Baumann of Sparkasse hit out from the start to scoop up points from the day’s three intermediate sprints. Fifteen miles into the stage, Baumann took the first sprint in New Haven and didn’t look back. Baumman captured all three sprints, briefly taking over the sprint points lead.

Break led by Carlos Oyarzun (Tecos) crests the first KOM followed a few minutes later by the field with Steven Cozza (Garmin-Chipotle) and the Symmetrics team in front.

Back in the peloton, teams Garmin-Chipotle and Symmetrics set the pace at the front of the peloton, both aiming to defend the first and third positions in the G.C. As the undulating landscape thinned into the flat grounds near St. Charles, the peloton steadily reeled in Baumann and the ten-man break. As the race entered St. Charles historic district, teams Rabobank, Toyota-United, Garmin-Chipotle and Columbia lined up their sprinters with Cavendish getting the best of the peloton again.

Stage 6 podium: Ivan Dominguez (Toyota-United), Mark Cavendish (Columbia), Brad Huff (Jelly Belly)

Another good day for Columbia with Most Aggressive Rider Bernhard Eisel and Mark Cavendish in the green sprint jersey

With no Michelob Ultra King of the Mountain lines during tomorrow’s circuit, Dominique Rollin of Toyota-United will wear the Michelob Ultra King of the Mountain jersey tomorrow. Roman Kreuziger of Liquigas will wear the THF Realty Best Young Rider jersey. With his stage six victory, Cavendish will defend the Edward Jones Sprint jersey tomorrow. Bernhard Eisel, the last surviving rider of today’s breakaway group, was awarded the Drury Hotels Most Aggressive Rider Jersey for Stage Six.

No changes in the jerseys, Roman Kreuzinger is still Best Young Rider and Dominique Rollin is the 2008 Tour of Missouri King of the Mountain and Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Chipotle) still wears the yellow jersey

For the second consecutive year, the 2008 Tour of Missouri will culminate with a 70 mi/112.7 circuit race around St. Louis, starting at 2:00 p.m. The course features three final opportunities to earn Edward Jones sprint points, taking riders by several St. Louis landmarks, including Forest Park and Union Station.

All photos copyright Lyne Lamoureux

I caught up with the BMC team at the start of the 2008 Tour of Missouri stage 5, in St James where the riders were getting ready for another aggressive stage in high humidity. Mike Sayers announced his retirement earlier this year, and is racing his last big race at the Tour of Missouri. Going into the day, Jeff Louder was sitting in tenth place in the overall classification and had been very aggressive in the previous day’s break. Darren Lill had a great time trial result finishing in seventh place but missed the move on stage 4, and is now back to hunting for stage wins and assisting his teammate in moving up the GC. Finally, Jonathan Garcia is hitting his form after suffering two hard crashes this year.

This is your last big race, this is it. How does it feel?
Mike: Yes, this is it. I get mixed feelings, the team, I think they finalized the roster this week, and they are doing a press release, I feel a little bit left out honestly but it’s part of it. Especially after a day like yesterday where I suffered a little bit and those are the days I’m not really going to miss. I think as we get closer to Sunday, it’s going to be a little more difficult. The only good thing is that Ive known it’s coming and I can prepare myself for it, just going to give the last couple of days everything I got. The team is riding really well which is awesome, that’s one thing I’m really proud of, how far the team has come, how far the team is going. It’s just kind of the natural evolution of things.

The BMC team seems to have brought it up a level in the last few months, what brought this on?
Mike: I just think it was the progression, I just think it took us some time to get guys organized and get some experience in the bank, again I think we’ve reached that point, obviously the leadership from Gavin[Chilcott] and John [Lelangue] has made a big difference, they were always pushing guys to be aggressive and I think it does help you get a little more cohesive. I think it’s just a combination of things, I just think it’s generally the natural maturity of how things are going. And you bring in some more experienced riders like Tony [Cruz] and Jeff [Louder], they make a big difference, it’s not just me telling guys what to do, those guys are talented enough to kind of lead by example, it’s been really nice and a really nice team to finish up with, that’s one of the great things, I get to leave on one of the best teams and just kind of be proud of that whole thing.

Read the rest of this entry »

Dutch rider Boy Van Poppel of Rabobank got the best of the charging peloton around him, powering ahead of them to cross the finish line first and win Stage Five of the 2008 Tour of Missouri his first in the U.S. The 20-year old Dutch cyclocross champion’s well-timed effort netted him the slight edge over teammate Michael Van Stayen for his first win in the United States. Keven Lacombe (Kelly Benefit Strategies-Medifast) rounded out the top three.

Rabobank teammates Boy Van Poppel and Michael Van Stayen get the 1-2 spots

“I was in fifth place and there was someone coming from behind. He attacked and took a few meters. I was thinking I had to go now. It may be too early but that’s better than too late,” said Van Poppel. “I was waiting for the guys behind to come to my left but no one came and I was going ‘yes, I’m going to win.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Kids were out in force at the start where each class visited their adopted team.

Steven Cozza (Garmin-Chiptole)
“It [the moustache] started to go out of style, I was tired of eating hair with my food. Plus that Italian racer started growing his and kind of ruined it, I had to share it off.”

“It’s going to be a battle, we’re going to be riding in the front, it’s going to be really painful but I think we’re strong enough and we can do it. ”

George Hincapie (Columbia) puts in an attack in the first kilometers

Garmin-Chipotle team leading the field at the second KOM

Christan Vande Velde (Garmin-Chipotle)

“I was concerned all day. It was a brutally hard day and they threw everything at us, the team did a great job. There was no respite at all today. we want just trying to control it as much as we can. The strategy is to keep control of the race and not let anybody go.”

Dominique Rollin (Toyota-United), KOM
” tomorrow there’s only one KOM in the stage and I have a good enough lead to not worry about those points and just maybe hope for a little breakaway to take over those points and we can relax and wait for the final in the sprint. I think we build enough lead on the points scale so this way we can just keep on going for our ultimate goal, a stage win in this year’s edition.”

Mike Barry (Columbia), stage winner and Most Agressive
Our strategy today was to make the race as hard as possible for Garmin. We have a couple of guys that are very close in the classification and we’d like to wrestle it away from Christian. We have to make the race as hard as possible, to isolate him and we managed to do that towards the end of the race and we kept attacking until the end and I found myself in position to go for the stage win. The team rode really well today and really it could have been any of the guys with the opportunity to go for the victory, it just happened to be me to attack, I attacked at the right time and got away.

Eric Baumann (Sparkasse), second on stage

“A really tough stage, all the time up and down, very fast. My team did a really good job, we were able to put guys in the big breakaway and at the end, only one guy was stronger than us. For us, it’s okay second place.”

“We do all the time in Europe the races, then we had a chance to come over here and we want to keep this chance so we can come in the nest years with these nice tours. I am only here for bikes, baby clothes and gap for my kids (laughs). ”

All photos copyright Lyne Lamoureux

Canadian Michael Barry of Team Columbia broke away from a lead group of 20 riders, less than 10 miles before the final circuits and held on to capture Stage Four of the 2008 Tour of Missouri. Berry finished 46 seconds ahead Eric Baumann of Sparkasse, who edged out third place finisher Danilo Wyss of the BMC Racing Team.

Christian Vande Velde’s (Garmin-Chipotle) fourth place finish allowed him to retain Missouri Tourism Leader’s jersey going into Stage Five with an 18-second lead over Michael Rogers of Team Columbia in the General Classification standings. Svein Tuft of Symetrics remains in third place. 2007 Tour of Missouri winner George Hincapie (Team Columbia) remains in fourth place, with Vande Velde’s teammate Tom Danielson in fifth place.

Read the rest of this entry »

Christian Vande Velde (Garmin-Chipotle), stage winner and yellow jersey
“It’s always great to have time splits and know that you are going well. I always start off quite slow and Dave [Zabriskie] goes quite fast. To know that I was within a couple seconds of him was nice to know, then I had Mick behind me which is probably the best… I thought he was going to catch me actually, it’s great motivation for sure.”

Michael Rodgers (Columbia), second in stage
“That was one of the reason that I came to this race was to do this time trial in preparation for the World Championships later on this month in Italy. I think it was the hardest time trial I’ve done this year, course wise, there are certainly some good riders and to finish second to especially to Christian is a positive thing.: said Rodgers

Svein Tuft (Symmetrics), third in stage
“I think Beijing gave me a lot of confidence as a rider, I did everything as far as preparation that I could coming into it and it really gave me a ton of confidence as far as being a time trialist and knowing what I could do. I could see there that I could compete with some of the best guys in the world and that’s really help me coming into this race, and being like ‘man you should not mess around at all, just do what you know you need to do’ ” .

Sprinter Mark Cavendish (Columbia) lost the yellow jersey

Points jersey Andy Guptill (Colavita/Sutter Home); Dominique Rollin (Toyota-United) enjoys his beer received every time he gets the KOM jersey which is every day so far.

All photos copyright Lyne Lamoureux

American Christian Vande Velde claimed dominance to the rest of the field, winning the individual time trial in Branson Wednesday at the Tour of Missouri.

Vande Velde, who finished an impressive 5th at this year’s Tour de France, finished the 18-mile race against the clock in 39 minutes and 51 seconds.

“The win was actually a bit of a surprise,” said Vande Velde, who recently fell off form at the Olympics less than a month ago, finishing 17th there. “This reinvigorates me, honestly. This was a big challenge. And, to beat the guy who won three world championships is big.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Overall race leader Mark Cavendish of Team Columbia gained his second consecutive stage victory, finishing a bike-length ahead of the bunched peloton to capture stage two of the Tour of Missouri in Springfield, Mo. Cavendish, who won four stages at the 2008 Tour de France, was followed to the line by Eric Baumann of Sparkasse and team Liquigas’ Francesco Chicch.

After today’s action, Cavendish stretched his lead in the General Classification to 12 seconds over Chicchi, whose Stage Two performance moved him to second place in the G.C. while Baumann rounds out the top three. Notable American riders in the G.C. top 25 after Stage Two include George Hincapie (Team Columbia) in 18th place and Christian Vande Velde in 24th place.

Cavendish’s teammates positioned him for victory by controlling the peloton for the entire race and ensuring that an early breakaway group of five riders didn’t gained too much time on the field. The breakaway was caught just before reaching the final circuits in Springfield, then Team Columbia jousted with riders from Sparkasse and Garmin-Chipotle to give Cavendish the position he needed coming into the final straightaway.

“It was a case of keeping our position until the last two kilometers and then hitting out,” said Cavendish of his team’s strategy in the race’s final moments. “The pace was so high that I was dropped off at 150 meters to go. Nothing else to do but win really, it was as simple as that. ”

Sunny skies and a large group cheering fans greeted riders as they embarked from Clinton, Mo. and its historic downtown square. The longest stage of the Tour provided a battleground for elite sprinters with two Edward Jones Sprint competitions (Stockton and Willard.) After a rapid fire series of break attempts, a five-man breakaway group formed at the 20-mile mark of the race. Mike Sayers (BMC Racing), Andy Guptill (Colavita/Sutter Home), Andreas Schillinger (Sparkasse), Reid Mumford (Kelly Benefit Strategies/Medifast) and Andrew Randell (Symmetrics) hit off through the picturesque farmland and woodland areas of southwestern Missouri. Their group’s advantage over the field hovered around three minutes for most of the race before disintegrating prior to the finishing circuits in Springfield.

For Guptill’s efforts in today’s break, he was awarded the Drury Hotels Aggressive Rider Jersey. Cavendish will continue to wear the Missouri Tourism Leader’s jersey. He is also Edward Jones Sprint Leader and THF Realty Best Young Rider points leader. The latter two jerseys will be worn tomorrow by the riders holding second place in the respective competitions, with Chicchi in the sprint jersey and Kohler (BMC) donning the best young rider. Today’s race didn’t offer riders an opportunity to earn Michelob Ultra King of the Mountain points, leaving Dominique Rollin of Toyota United Pro Cycling as the jersey wearer going into stage 3.

While Stage Two’s course encompasses a sparsely populated region of Missouri, fans from towns along the route came out in large numbers, including many young students given the day off to the experience the race and cheer the riders on.

“You see a town sign that says ‘population 95’, a very small town but it seems like the entire town will be out there, “ said Guptill. “It’s never really a dull moment; there is always some sort of motivation and people always yelling out there.”

Stage Three, the Individual Time Trial (ITT), starts in Branson, Mo. at 11:00 a.m. The starting order for the (ITT) follows in the reverse order of the G.C. standings with each rider taking off from the start ramp in one minute intervals. The final ten riders will leave in two minute intervals. The ITT course, which was used during the 2007 Tour of Missouri, starts at the Landing and challenges riders with three climbs, including a 2.5 mile trek to Shepherd of the Hills Homestead and Outdoor Center, which was featured in John Wayne’s movie of the same title.

Team Columbia’s Mark Cavendish won his second bunch sprint at the Tour of Missouri today in Springfield. German Eric Baumann (Sparkasse) was second and Francesco Chicchi (Liquigas) was third, again.

Ex-teammates and friends David Zabriskie (Garmin-Chipotle) and George Hincapie (Columbia)

Read the rest of this entry »