Freire disqualified from stage win, Gavazzi awarded victory

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Oscar Freire’s victory celebrations at the Vuelta al Pais Vasco turned to consternation and despair a few minutes after he won the sprint in Zalla, when race officials relegated him down the results for dangerous racing.

Freire won the sprint by several bike lengths ahead Francesco Gavazzi (Lampre-ISD) with Kristof Vandewalle (Quick Step) but was relegated to 47th place, at the back of the group that contested the sprint.

Television helicopter images showed that both Freire and his teammate Luis Leon Sanchez out took their hands off the bars inside the final kilometre to push aside other riders. Then in sight of the line, Sanchez pushed Freire forward before he started his sprint.

The race judges awarded the victory to Gavazzi, with John Gadret (AG2R-La Mondiale) moving up to third.

Freire was ready to climb onto the winner’s podium and collect the flowers and was stunned to have been relegated, claiming he had not done anything wrong.

“I’m surprised to hear the news. It’s not fair,” he said on Spanish television. “In the last two hundred meters I showed that I was the strongest.”

“My teammate touched me as I passed but I don’t think it was an important help because I was passing him. As you can see, I made the difference with my sprint, not him with a push.”

Gavazzi was a little embarrassed to climb on the podium and celebrating victory after crossing the line in second place. “I did my sprint on the left, while Oscar came up on the right. I didn’t see the sprint, so I can’t really say what happened. I was happy with second and I’m happy with first.”

The battle for overall victory

The sprint finish and high-speed run into Zalla also saw the overall contenders fighting for a good result to defend their position overall and vitally their starting slot in Saturday’s decisive 27km time trial.

Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) finished 11th and so held onto the overall race lead. Klöden finished 14th in his Rodriguez’s slipstream, while third Samuel Sanchez (Euskaltel-Euskadi) was tenth.

All three are still on the same time, with 2010 winner Christopher Horner (RadioShack) fourth overall at one second and Ryder Hesjedal (Garmin-Cervelo) fifth at six seconds. Ten riders are within ten seconds of each other in the overall classification, making it a wide open race. Every second will count in the time trial with the riders starting later having the slight advantage of knowing of their rivals’ times.

Rodriguez will start last and wear the race leader’s yellow jersey but knows he has little chance of overall success. Klöden, Horner, Hesjedal and perhaps Alexandre Vinokourov (Astana), who is tenth at ten seconds, seem the favourites to fill the final podium on Saturday.

"I’m really happy about my Pais Vasco and about keeping the race lead for another day. Now we’ll see what happens in the time trial,” Rodriguez said.

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