Greipel wins again in Turkey

Image 1 of 15

André Greipel (HTC-Columbia) won his second consecutive stage at the Presidential Tour of Turkey in Turgutreis on Monday to extend his overall lead in the eight-day stage race to 16 seconds on American teammate Tejay Van Garderen.

On Sunday Greipel won the 5.8km opening time trial stage in Istanbul and has now won eight races so far this season.

The experienced German managed to survive several late attacks from Giovanni Visconti (ISD-Neri) and Rein Taaramäe (Cofidis) before his teammate Mark Renshaw gave him a perfect lead-out in the long finishing straight.

Greipel then followed Italy's Francesco Chicchi (Liquigas) but switched to the wheel of Jose Ventoso (Carmiooro-NGC) before opening up his on sprint to hit the line first. Italy's Angelo Furlan (Lampre-Farnese Vini) was second and Claudio Cucinotta (De Rosa-Stac Plastic) was third.

Thanks to the time bonus, Greipel extended his overall lead to 16 seconds on Van Garderen. Maciek Bodnar (Liquigas-Doimo) is third at 19 seconds.

“It was a really tough day, a lot of climbing particularly in the last 20 kilometres but André stuck in there and we finally got the win,” HTC-Columbia’s sports director Jan Schaffrath said.

“The whole team did a great job, Gert Dockx and Alexsej Saramotins were particularly strong, bringing back the attackers time after time. The stage profile looked like a heart rate monitor, there were so many little climbs. Fortunately none of them were too big, the longest was about three kilometres.

“The last sprint was a little bit dangerous though, and came after another little climb in the final kilometres, but André held on and then did a great sprint.”

Rolling roads in the finale

The rolling roads in the finale of the stage was a real test for Greipel and his HTC-Columbia teammates but they rode it with intelligence and came away with victory.

Earlier, Hubert Schwab (Vorarlberg-Corratec), Christophe Kern (Cofidis), Diego Caccia (ISD-Neri) and Kiendys Tomasz (CCC Polsat Polkowice) opened a four-minute lead on the bunch but were caught in the final hour of racing.

HTC-Columbia set a high tempo to dissuade attacks, then when Visconti attacked with 15km to go, Greipel went after him and stayed on his wheel until his teammates regained their composure. Rein Taaramäe (Cofidis) made a strong attack with nine kilometres and got a gap but other sprinters' teams such as Colnago-CSF Inox and Liquigas-Doimo combined with HTC-Columbia to chase him down.

Visconti tried one more time with two kilometres to go but he was caught by Ermanno Capelli (Footon-Servetto) with a kilometre to go and they were both swept up in sight of the finish as the sprinters fought for position.

Renshaw played it cool in the sprint, using the huge lead-out experience he's gathered while working for Mark Cavendish to perfectly position Greipel. When he moved over, Greipel accelerated hard and won thanks to his superior speed.

However there is little chance of Greipel completing a hat trick of wins on Tuesday. The 166km third stage is from Bodrum to Marmaris and includes two climbs to over 700 metres and then two shorter climbs near the finish.