Petacchi, Di Luca to Memorial Cimurri

Italian sprinter Alessandro Petacchi will contest the 198.3 kilometer Memorial Cimurri on Saturday. He will bring the majority of his lead-out train, including Mirko Celestino, Andrey Grivko, Niki Terpstra, Alberto Ongarato, Fabio Sabatini, Carlo Scognamiglio, and his final lead-out, Marco Velo.

The Liquigas team will surprisingly be able to field Danilo Di Luca, who was refused a start by the Italian Olympic Committee for the World Championships after coming under investigation for alleged doping. He will be joined by Vincenzo Nibali, Filippo Pozzato, Murilo Fischer, Leonardo Bertagnolli, Dario Cataldo, last year's winner Enrico Gasparotto and Franco Pellizotti.

Petacchi will have to fight against a strong Gerolsteiner squad, with Bernard Kohl, Fabian Wegmann, Johannes Fröhlinger, Tim Klinger, Andrea Moletta, Ronny Scholz, Oliver Zaugg and stagiaire Mathias Frank under direction of Christian Henn.