Sanchez speediest in Varades

Luis Leon Sanchez (Caisse d'Epargne) claimed a sprint victory in the opening stage of the Circuit Cycliste Sarthe - Pays de la Loire in Varades, France on Tuesday.

The Spaniard, currently first in the International Cycling Union's world rankings, upstaged more established sprint rivals Marko Kump (Adria Mobil) and Anthony Ravard (Ag2R-La Mondiale) to claim stage honours and the first leader's jersey of the race.

The victory was Sanchez's third stage win of the season, following his victory at the Tour Down Under in January and indvidual time trial triumph at the Tour of the Algarve in February.

"The stage was very fast," said Sanchez. "Before the finish I talked to Mathieu Drujon who is the sprinter for our team in this race. He told me that is was not feeling good enough to sprint himself but that he wanted to help me.

"There was a curve at 400 meters from the finish. I was on Arnaud Coyot's wheel with Drujon in third position. We launched the sprint at that time and were immediately fifteen meters ahead of the bunch, which was sufficient to prevent the pack to come back."

Sanchez will now try to defend his overall lead in the race, although he knows it will be a challenge.

"I am the leader now and we will try to defend that jersey. It will not be easy because we only have six riders on the team, which means that it will be very difficult to control the situation.

"Nevertheless we are here with a strong team even if we unfortunately lost Iván Gutiérrez who had to quit the race today after suffering from allergy and we will fight to try and win the race."

"I know the Circuit de la Sarthe pretty well and I can say that it is absolutely not an easy race. The stages are rather difficult with plenty of short hills and tomorrow two half stages are in the program. The first one will include 97 kilometers and in the afternoon there is a short individual time trial, less than seven kilometers."

French teams take flight on home soil

Earlier in the stage, Yuriy Krivtsov (Ag2R-La Mondiale) had been the first rider to gain any time over his rivals as he attacked after 23 kilometres. But with 185 kilometres on the agenda his task was always likely to be a futile one as he was reabsorbed after five kilometres.

After several parries from the peloton, a group of ten riders established the first meaningful escape. Anthony Roux (Française des Jeux), Christophe Moreau (Caisse d'Epargne), Sebastian Minard (Cofidis), Yaroslav Popovych (RadioShack), Jean-Marc Marino (Saur-Sojasun), Philip Deignan (Cervelo), Thierry Hupond (Skil-Shimano), Steve Morabito (BMC Racing Team) and Uros Murn (Adria Mobil) going clear after 58 kilometres.

The group fought hard to stretch their advantage beyond 30 seconds, but the peloton, not satisfied with the make up of the escape, refused to let them go, and by the feed zone at 92 kilometres they had reeled in all but three of the leaders. Moreau, Popovych and Minard the most resistant to the peloton's advances.

The trio's slim advantage was given a boost by the arrival of Thomas Voeckler (Bbox Bouygues Telecom) and Kristjan Fajt (Adria Mobil), and subsequently Angel Madrazo (Caisse d'Epargne), Xavier Florencio (Cervelo) and Albert Timmer (Skil-Shimano).

With eight men now out in front, a 24 rider chase group established itself from the peloton. Within two kilometres these men had joined the leaders to create a huge leading group. The peloton, unimpressed by the huge numbers ahead began to cut down the 1:10 advantage held by the leaders. Sensing the delicacy of their situation Fajt and Yury Trofimov (Bbox Bouygues Telecom) established a fresh break.

The duo was able to build up a 2:20 buffer with 30 kilometres to race, Trofimov's Bbox squad keeping tabs on the front of the peloton. However, they couldn't stop the waves of Ag2-La Mondiale and Française des Jeux riders who came to the front, determined to spoil the day for their French rivals ahead.

With 20 kilometres to race the leader's advantage had dropped to 1:40, and 10 kilometres later the gap was 0:55.

Swinging underneath the 5-to-go banner, Fajt and Trofimov were clinging to only 12 seconds, with the sprinters teams all lending a hand in the chase. Two kilometres later, the pair was caught. With a sprint inevitable, the race had one more surprise in store as Luis Leon Sanchez (Caisse d'Epargne) rushed ahead of the peloton to snatch a win to impress the team's French sponsor.