Durbridge repeats with Sarthe time trial win

Luke Durbridge of Orica GreenEdge repeated his success of one year ago, when the 6.8km individual time trial in the streets of Angers led to his first stage race victory at the Circuit de la Sarthe-Pays de la Loire. It has a different taste this time around with a much smaller gap over the other riders and the finish of stage 4 located atop the Mont des Avaloirs instead of the bottom in the town of Pré-en-Pail.

Durbridge preceded Luxembourg prodigy Bob Jungels of RadioShack by only 0.17 seconds, and the top ten finishers were all within seven seconds. Last year's runner up Manuele Boaro (Saxo Bank) finished eight seconds down.

On the same course, the West Australian rode three seconds slower than in 2012. "My time is slower but my power is better," Durbridge told Cyclingnews. "The wind was different, especially the crosswind towards the end, but it's still a victory and I'm very happy about that. It's very close but I've also lost time trials by less than a second, so I know how it feels on the other hand. In this specialty, you can't control what everyone else does."

Jungels was also very philosophical about losing by so little. "I didn't think I could time trial at the same level as Durbridge," the Luxembourger said. "This course was a bit too short for me. I'm really happy with my performance. I've got no regrets. I rode at my maximum. It wasn't an easy course with some tricky curves. My state of form is good. It was a small surprise for me to win the GP Nobili last month but it's good to feel that the form is still there. Every year, I'm good in March, so I follow my points of reference."

With two undulated stages to go, the Circuit de la Sarthe looks more open than ever with an upcoming Orica GreenEdge vs. RadioShack match. "We have a good team, we hope to do well on GC," said Jungels.

With Jesse Sergent on sixth place and Tony Gallopin ninth, the Luxembourg-based team has the clear ambition to dethrone Durbridge, but the Australian squad has also more in store than only their national champion. Finishing third, Cameron Meyer enjoyed his first good result in Europe after winning the Oceania championship. "It was only my second time on the time trial bike this year," he said. Svein Tuft, fifth, and Michael Hepburn, tenth, completed the positive showing of Orica-GreenEdge.

"We have a strong team," noted Durbridge who was left with only two teammates (Pieter Weening and Daniel Teklehaimanot) at this point of the Circuit de la Sarthe one year ago. "Last year I got dropped in that hill of stage 4 and I got back on. This time, the finish is uphill but my condition is better. I remember it's a tough stage. They were attacking and going crazy. I expect RadioShack to attack me but others too. Thomas Voeckler and his guys [from Europcar] are here to prepare Pierre Rolland for the Ardennes classics, so I believe they'll ride hard to see where their form is. I'm ready to take up the challenge."

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