Santos Tour Down Under 2012

January 17, Stage 1: Prospect - Clare 149km

Greipel goes two-straight with photo finish win over Petacchi in Clare

By:

Alex Hinds

Published:

January 17, 05:21,

Updated:

January 18, 09:38

German retains ochre jersey on crash-marred day

Greipel (Lotto-Belisol) still behind with metres to go. He just edged Petacchi on the line.

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German Andre Greipel (Lotto-Belisol) has taken his second straight win at the Tour Down Under, and his first on the road for the season, with a photo finish sprint over Italian rider Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre-ISD) in Clare. Greipel will wear the ochre jersey tomorrow courtesy of the 10 second time bonus he earned on the finish.

"I’m lucky that I won today," said Greipel. "There was a massive crash with 800 metres to go. My pedal got touched and I lost positions from about 5th to 20th. But I managed to bridge the gap.

"[Then] Petacchi went from left to right, he didn’t care about the crash. He’s a big star but he shouldn’t do this. Two of my team-mates crashed as a result. All I care about after winning this stage is how they are."

Petacchi denied any wrongdoing, a fact commissaires agreed with after reviewing footage of the final kilometre.

"I moved over slightly, but I gave him all the space he needed. In fact, he passed me," said the Italian who benefited from a perfect launch from teammates Davide Vigano and Danilo Hondo.

The crash happened before Petacchi's controversial manoeuvring, and seemed to be caused by two Vacansoleil riders tangling, with more than 20 riders including key Greipel teammate Jurgen Roelandts (Lotto-Belisol) and Frederic Guesdon (FDJ-BigMat) going down. Guesdon and Roelandts were both taken to Royal Adelaide Hosptial, Guesdon with a suspected broken hip that is potentially career ending, and Roelandts having scans on his neck.

Stuart O'Grady said the crash was "always going to happen" considering the fatigue in the peloton.

"There were a lot of tired guys out there. It really does have have a lot of effect on guys, the heat and it causes slow reactions and you can see a crash is always going to happen."

Yauheni Hutarovich (FDJ - BigMat) took third with pre-stage favourites Mark Renshaw (Rabobank) and Chris Sutton (Sky) off the pace apparently caught behind in the carnage that ensued from the crash. Both still finished inside the top 10.

Rohan Dennis (UniSA) took the young rider's jersey courtesy of the bonus seconds he picked up in the intermediate sprints on the road. Martin Kohler (BMC) took out the sprint competition, whilst Marcello Pavarin (Vacasoliel-DCM) will wear the King of the Mountains jersey.

"It was probably the toughest day on the bike I've had in a race," said an exhaused Rohan Dennis in Clare. "Considering there was no hills. The headwind meant we were going around 20 kilometres an hour at some points - it was tough."

How it unfolded

The race was characterised by hot and blustery conditions, with a northerly headwind making the going really tough for the riders on a day that saw temperatures peak in the 40s.

A break got away as soon as the race neutral zone finished at Gepps Cross with four riders, Rohan Dennis (UniSA), Marcello Pavarin (Vacansoleil-DCM), Martin Kohler (BMC) and Eduard Vorganov (Katusha) building an advantage of more than 11 minutes before there was any real reaction from the main field.

GreenEdge put Stuart O'Grady and Luke Durbridge near the front to keep the gap within reach, with other teams concentrating on keeping themselves hydrated.

The first sprint at Kapunda went to Martin Kohler (BMC), followed by Rohan Dennis (UniSA) and Pavarin third.

On the day's only categorised climb Pavarin made an attack to distance his break companions and grab the points on offer, soft pedalling over the crest of the climb to earn himself the jersey. Kohler was second with Vorganov third.

With less than 60 kilometres to go, a number of teams rallied at the front and the gap immediately started to drop. Through the third sprint it had halved to less than 5 minutes, with Kohler again picking up the top position, and garnering himself an extra few seconds.

Sky, GreenEdge, and Lotto-Belisol led the chase, and by 25 kilometres to go it looked like the catch was imminent - the break holding a drastically reducing 90 second advantage over the main field. Lotto-Belisol swung off the peloton as key lead-out man Greg Henderson crashed. The Kiwi was okay however and was able to work his way back into the main field.

At 15 kilometres remaining, Rohan Dennis decided to go it alone, leaving behind his break companions, and tried his luck solo. He was close to a minute ahead very quickly. But with fatigue and the hot headwind his main impediments his time out front was short-lived.

That left a bunch sprint looming. The downhill run into the line allowed the peloton to really wind up, Will Clarke (UniSA-Australia) had a late dig, but nothing would deny the bunch.

A crash in the final kilometres created chaos in the organisation of the sprint trains, and Alessandro Petacchi jumped early to try and take advantage.

The Italian however had not quite enough and was passed by Andre Greipel on the line, the big German showing Sunday's win in Rymill Park was no fluke.

Video Highlights courtesy Santos Tour Down Under

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