Staying at the zenith

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Ale-Jet does it for the ninth time in the 2004 Giro (Image credit: Olympia)

A common sporting catchphrase is "It's harder to stay at the top than to reach it". Italy's Alessandro Petacchi (Fassa Bortolo) seems to have overcome the difficulty of staying at the zenith of the best sprinters in the world. He had a tremendous 2003, amazingly winning 15 stages in Grand Tours (six in the Giro d'Italia, four in the Tour de France and five in the Vuelta a España). He had already said to the press that his 2004 season would be tougher for him, as the previous year was brilliant.

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AP: I think it was more or less the same. I think that, like in life, to repeat big achievements with many victories from former years is very difficult. In everything the next year is more difficult than the first one. Because people expect things, the team expect that you have a good season, as the former year you had a great season and everybody thinks it is so normal that you get many triumphs. So, that makes you a little nervous during the winter training. All the people talk, everybody, the media, the TV; they are all waiting for big results. However, this year I take things easily because after very good seasons I train well and I am calm. Everything goes fine, I will do a season similar to the last one. That's what I hope. But, of course, I don't have the crystal ball.

AP: Yes, it's a country I like a lot. I like the people, I like to ride there. I like Spanish riders, I like the language. What I see inside and outside the race is that it is a country I like almost as I like Italy. I enjoy Vuelta's routes. There are tough stages, normal stages, stages of medium difficulty. It's possible that I start racing in Andalusia and Valencia, but I'm not sure because my team doesn't know whether it moves to Andalusia as that would be a problem for the Pro Tour. Though I'm sure I'll go to the [Vuelta] Valenciana.

AP: I see [Robbie] McEwen among the sprinters in the Giro for sure. Then in the Vuelta there are always Erik Zabel and Oscar Freire. These are two riders I worry about because they are two big champions. I saw Oscar was going to prepare for the World's [in the last edition of the Vuelta] and that he wanted to win one or two Vuelta stages. I saw him as a very strong rider. So, in the sprints I was worried about him. There are other riders. There is Tom Boonen who went to the Tour, Cipollini…but the riders I faced more last season were McEwen, Zabel and Freire.

AP: I felt better than in 2003 for sure. I didn't do the sprints the way I wanted. I had strong team-mates. I reached the last kilometre [on the flat stages] very easily because my team worked very much before and I thought about the Giro, where my team supported me until the last 200 metres. I thought that after the race. That was my fault for sure because if I had made a different kind of sprint in the Tour, I would have had better results.

AP: Certainly it was because I had good preparation and I had trained well in the winter. I performed well in the first races of the season. Then, I took a rest after San Remo. I raced just the Vuelta a Aragon and the Giro di Romandia just three stages because I wanted to come back home before the Giro to rest in order to reach the Giro a bit stronger. It was certainly that and also that I had a so very strong team. Frigo didn't race the Giro because he was sick. [DS Giancarlo] Ferretti said "Well, we don't have Frigo among us, so we are going to do the Giro just for you, with all the men for you". Then the mountain riders all worked for me. The whole team supported me in the first days, then in the mountain stages, if they feel good, they work just in the sprint, five or six kilometres to the finish line. So, I had eight riders for me and that's a lot. The team did a great job and I had good sprints.

AP: Well. I saw the route last December 2. I was in Madrid to see it and I liked it. I saw it like quite a fast route, it is not completely flat but I think it is a bit fast. There's only one hard uphill that is not very long. There are other parts that are uphills and downhills but not many. So, I think the World's is certainly for Freire, for Zabel, for fast riders. I think it's a course for Oscar. I hope it is for me too. I hope I feel good, I have a good World's and I hope I sprint well. I plan to have a good Vuelta to prepare myself well.

AP: I think he is a very strong rider. In the last two seasons he couldn't do what he is capable of. He had to ride the Giro and the Tour and he tried to do it well. He always felt bad during the Vuelta, in the end he was sick. But he had a good Tour [2004], he won one stage. But the team expects something else of riders like him who have won a Grand Tour [2002 Vuelta]. I don't know why he didn't do well in these seasons. I think he is a strong rider, strong in time trials, in a team or alone. Of course we lack a rider like him in Fassa Bortolo because he is very good.

AP: It's clear that we don't have a big champion for the general classification, either for big or small races. But we have Frigo who is a specialist on one-week races, he can do a good Giro d'Italia. We have very good riders like [Fabian] Cancellara and [Kim] Kirchen who I think can perform well. Another rider is [Juan Antonio] Flecha. He is a great person, he is mentally very strong. He is always on the breakaways, he always trains a lot. He is a cheerful and fun person.

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