The plan for the day -get to the front of the race as soon as the neutral zone is done and drop the hammer. ATTACK, form a break and go to work. These guys are not playing. 180k of work by the quintet. That is a long day in the saddle, that is work, no question about it. It is one thing to be in the peloton rolling along being pulled along by the group, and then you have the break that is a rolling paceline of unadulterated WORK. If you need me I'll be back here chatting with some of the other guys, sure I grab you some water and a sandwich.
Tomas Voeckler of Europcar (I have a feeling you will be hearing his name and Europcar more this season) in the French tricolor champion's jersey took a little turn as an escapee and was joined by Kadri (AG2R) who was in the first break of the day. They were able to take some liberties with the bunch and built a small but respectable 20sec gap. But sadly the peloton had other ideas and they were caught under 5k to go.
The run-in to the finish was no run in. This thing looked like a crit course from 90degree land. The final left-hand turn Peter Sagan (Liquigas) crashed and took several riders down. I watched the video a few times and it looked like his rear tire rolled, well it did roll. Now, the question is -did it just roll, or did it roll as a result of an impact from tire on tire/wheel on wheel? It is really hard to see if there was contact other than Sagan and the ground.
Everything went kind of pear-shaped after Sagan's incident with bodies and bikes flying -no joke watch the footage. The sprint just kind of went off when the crash happened and Goss (HTC) was in a drag race with Haussler(Garmin), Rojas (Movistar), Thomas and Henderson of Sky. Let's just say Goss earned his paycheck today, the hard way. For you bean counters out there, you can chalk up number 7 for Goss. Did anyone set the alarm for Cavendish? If this is not a wake-up call, I don't know what is, good thing they are on the same team. My question is: Who is working for who? -"Who do you work for #2?"
1 Matthew Harley Goss (Aus) HTC-Highroad 5:16:48
2 Heinrich Haussler (Aus) Team Garmin-Cervelo
3 Denis Galimzyanov (Rus) Katusha Team
4 Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil (Spa) Movistar Team
5 Geraint Thomas (GBr) Sky Procycling
6 Greg Henderson (NZl) Sky Procycling
7 Anthony Ravard (Fra) AG2R La Mondiale
8 Francesco Gavazzi (Ita) Lampre - ISD
9 Romain Feillu (Fra) Vacansoleil-DCM Pro Cycling Team
10 Valerio Agnoli (Ita) Liquigas-Cannondale
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