Chicchi sprints to win in penultimate stage

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The Tour of Missouri delivered the fastest-ever day of racing in North American stage racing history on Saturday, appropriately enough concluding in St. Joseph, the starting point of the Wild West's original speedy delivery service Pony Express. Italy's Francesco Chicchi chose his own path to glory, rocketing up the right side of the finishing straight while the other sprint contenders occupied themselves on the left.

Chicchi out-paced sprint leader Thor Hushovd (Cervelo TestTeam) and Argentina's Lucas Sebastian Haedo (Colavita-Sutter Home p/b Cooking Light) in another raucous bunch finish, continuing the fast men's domination of Missouri’s road stages.

Chicchi crossed the finish line in 3:41:41 for the 177.5-kilometre stage, an average speed of 48.04 km/h (29.86 mph). Despite nearly 5,000 feet of climbing on the typically undulating Missouri farmland, a stiff tailwind and aggressive racing from start to finish propelled the peloton to St. Joseph 25 minutes ahead of the fastest projected arrival time.

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Chicchi waited until the final stage of last year’s Missouri to win his first stage and this year victory arrived one day earlier, all the more sweet for his undermanned Liquigas squad. "We only had six guys but today they rode like 20," said Chicchi. "They launched me at 250 [metres to go] and I had great legs. The whole race was very fast. Everyone wanted to get into a break early on and it was 52 km/h for the first 80 kilometres. It was flying all day. Only at the Tour de France have I seen races like that."

For the first time a domestic team's sprinter cracked the top three on a Missouuri road stage, as Lucas Sebastian Haedo (Colavita-Sutter Home p/b Cooking Light) finished third for the stage, ending his heretofore frustrating race experience.

"The difference today versus the first four stages was my position," said Haedo, younger brother of yesterday's stage winner Juan Jose Haedo (Team Saxo Bank). "In the first couple of stages I couldn't get in the position that I wanted. Having the ProTour teams here, the people who race in Europe, if you don't get the good position than it’s very complicated.

"Unfortunately I crashed in stage four coming into Jefferson City and that was the best stage for me to win because it was an uphill finish,” he said. “I'm glad I had the chance to sprint today. The stage was very fast and in particular the last two kilometres was extremely fast. Inside one kilometre to go I got inside Hushovd’s wheel and he had his teammate doing the lead-out so I was in very good position."

A lesson learned

Race leader David Zabriskie (Garmin-Slipstream) spent his first stage in the yellow jersey and his team passed its first defensive test with flying colours. Zabriskie continues to lead Gustav Larsson (Team Saxo Bank) by 30 seconds and Tom Zirbel (Bissell Pro Cycling) by 44 seconds.

"The team was amazing today," said Zabriskie. "I knew they had it in them and they pulled through. The speed was very high and we didn't necessarily have to take the front because so many teams wanted to be in the break today."

Garmin-Slipstream capitalized on its experience from last year, when the squad endured a difficult day of racing to keep Christian Vande Velde in the leader's jersey. "We learned a lot last year,” he said. “The day where it really broke apart last year was when [Michael] Barry won that stage in Rolla. These roads are...you can't really take the front as a team and ride it. There are so many rollers that the other teams will come off of us and sling shot on the rollers and then you blow yourselves up. That’s why we just kind of let everyone do their race."

Zabriskie is one day of racing away from earning his first ever stage race victory and his tenure in the yellow jersey has had quite an affect on the Utah native. "I'm on cloud nine,” he said. “I've never been this happy before in my life. I really am enjoying the moment and it’s great to be with these guys [team-mates - Ed.]. In all seriousness, I know my emotions don't come through so much and a lot of people say I don't smile enough but I'm having a great time and I really am happy."

Speed is all you need

Unlike all of the previous road stages the first significant escape of the day didn't occur until just past the feed zone at kilometre 74.4 when Cervelo TestTeam's Jeremy Hunt rode off the front on his own. The 35-year-old Briton wasn't deemed a threat by the peloton and soon found himself three minutes ahead, but Hunt sat up after approximately 30 kilometres of solitude and was re-absorbed. Hunt would receive the day's most aggressive rider jersey for his efforts off the front.

Once Hunt was back in the peloton attack after attack was launched, but to no avail. Team Type 1's Chris Jones was one of many riders who tried to form an escape, only to succumb to the peloton's furious tail wind-fueled tempo. "The pace was unbelievable, that was amazing," said Jones. "You were just spun out going as fast as you can. It was good motorpacing.

"Garmin did a good job of holding things together. It would split, there'd be 20 guys off, and they'd weld it back together. They definitely rode strong."

Approaching the day's second intermediate sprint at kilometre 149.8, two riders - Frederique Robert (Quick Step) and Phillip Gaimon (Jelly Belly Cycling Team) - found a chink in the Garmin-Slipstream armour and made their escape. The pair worked smoothly together to claw their way to a 30-second advantage as they rolled across the sprint line, reached first by Gaimon.

"I wanted to get off the front and hope that the field sat up," said Gaimon. "It was an aggressive day, ridiculously fast. It just never stopped and the break would not go. It was unbelievable.

"We've been kind of waiting for this day all week but it just didn't happen. Garmin was real picky about letting a break go."

The duo received a powerful boost in horsepower as it arrived at the base of the 1.5-kilometre ascent to the day's only mountains classification line at kilometre 166. Astana's Levi Leipheimer and Yaroslav Popovych bridged the gap to Gaimon and Robert, but the quartet were absorbed by the peloton approaching the KOM line as mountains leader Moises Aldape Chavez (Team Type 1) crossed the line first, adding to his mountains classification leadership over Chris Anker Sorensen (Team Saxo Bank).

"There were two guys from Astana, then Sorensen and another rider," said Aldape. "Sorensen was going for it at one kilometer. He attacked and then I
went hard at 200 metres."

Chaos ensued crossing the KOM line as the peloton split into several groups and a threatening move by Marco Pinotti (Team Columbia-HTC), Alexandr Dyachenko (Astana) and Dario Cataldo (Quick Step) capitalized on the moment to make a bid for victory with less than 10 kilometres remaining. Pinotti is only one second behind third placed Zirbel and the escape set off alarm bells for the American Continental squad.

"Frank [Pipp] and Andy [Jacques-Maynes] just slayed themselves to bring him [Pinotti - Ed.] back," said Zirbel. "I didn't even know he was off the front. I was out of position because I thought I had a flat tire and [was] freaking out about that. I thought the sprinters' teams were going to bring everything back. But my team didn't even leave it to chance, they just killed themselves to bring him back.

"I actually thought he was going to wait until tomorrow," continued Zirbel. "He’s used to three week stage races so I'm sure he'll be going again tomorrow.”

After Bissell Pro Cycling neutralized the Pinotti break approaching five kilometres to go, Craig Lewis (Columbia-HTC), Jeff Louder (BMC Racing Team) and Luis Romero Amaran (Colavita-Sutter Home p/b Cooking Light) each tried solo attacks only to be brought back by the Cervelo TestTeam-led peloton looking for a second Hushovd victory.

As the peloton made the final turn onto the finishing straight at 500 metres to go Cervelo TestTeam looked to have the race under control, however the crafty Chicchi made his move with 250 metres to go on the opposite side of the road from Hushovd to earn his second career Tour of Missouri victory.

Tomorrow the peloton completes its final stage at the Tour of Missouri, a 114.9-kilometre circuit race in Kansas City. The battle for the final podium may go down to the wire on a circuit with a 16 percent climb which must be tackled seven times.

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