Overall a quiet day throughout today’s Paris-Nice stage for Team Radioshack. Another cold day of racing, the second stage of Paris-Nice began in Contres and it was a mainly flat stage with a few minor climbs towards the end. The end was flat, perfect for a sprint finish. There were three categorized climbs and three intermediate sprints throughout the 201.5 kilometer stage. Stage two passed through Vienne and ended in Limoges.
The attacks began early, with four riders able to get away and stay away for the majority of today’s stage. This group included Mauro Finetto (Liquigas), Jens Mouris (Vacansoleil), Laurent Mangel (Saur – Sojasun) and Koen de Kort (Skil – Shimano). With approximately 32 kilometers to go, Team Radioshack helped Rabobank, Astana and Columbia HTC work to pull back the breakaway that still consisted of Finetto, Mouris, Mangel and de Kort.
The pace of the peloton picked up significantly and with about 18 kilometers, all breakaway riders were brought back in. Leading into the finish, the pace was set by Liquigas, QuickStep and Vacansoleil. Team Radioshack was unseen for most of the end of this race. Soon after passing the flame rouge, a crash of five riders occurred taking down Astana’s Alberto Contador. The stage win went to William Bonnet of Bbox – Bouygues Telecom.
By Fitzalan Gorman, staff writer
I assume contador did not get injured?
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Does anyone know if Chris Horner is sick or hurt. He is more than 10 minutes down on GC. He showed great form in Murcia
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Was Contador’s cat sighted near, or leaving, the crash?
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Chris Horner is a master strategist. My best is that he is fine but putting himself far enough down on GC that he can go out on the hunt for a stage win later in the week. He’s done this before……but I’ll keep my fingers crossed too..I’d hate to hear he hurt himself or is sick.
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