Förster and Rodriguez in each other's way in Cali

Team Gerolsteiner led the charge the last kilometre in the penultimate stage of the Tour of California, trying to set up the sprint for Robert Förster, but a collision with Predictor-Lotto's Fred Rodriguez dropped him back to a sixth place finish on the stage. "The preparation in the last kilometres was actually perfect," Förster said, "but I was a little too early in the wind."

Then he made contact with Rodriguez, "whose foot somehow got caught in my front wheel." If that wasn't enough of a handicap, Förster's feet clipped out of the pedals, and he could only watch as CSC's J.J. Haedo fly by to take the win.

"The team worked really well," said team manager Hans-Michael Holczer. "That was a very fast stage in which we were very active at the end."