Spaniard Oscar Freire of the Rabobank team dominated some of the world’s fastest sprinters to win the ninth stage of the Tour de France on Tuesday.
After 169,5km of racing from Bordeaux, Serguei Gonchar of the T-Mobile team retained the race leader’s yellow jersey ahead of the first climbing stage of the race, a 190,5km ride from Cambo-Les-Bains to Pau.
Gonchar, the first Ukrainian to wear the coveted yellow jersey, holds a one-minute lead over American Floyd Landis of Phonak, with his T-Mobile teammate Michael Rogers of Australia third at 1:08.
Freire, meanwhile, now has three career stage wins on the race, winning the fifth stage in Caen and claiming his maiden win in 2002.
The Spaniard kept his cool in the long home straight to surge past Belgian world champion Tom Boonen and Erik Zabel before holding off a resurgent Robbie McEwen by a matter of centimetres at the finish.
Boonen, who has yet to win a stage on this year’s race, finished fourth behind Germany’s Zabel.
With Wednesday’s first climbing stage set to begin the process of elimination on the race, the peloton was delighted the organisers had decided to squeeze in a flat stage after Monday’s rest day.
The sprinters’ teams, in particular, had this stage in their sights, and made sure the early breakaway, composed of Christian Knees, Stephane Auge and Walter Beneteau, did not gain too much ground.
The trio formed after Knees, who is on his first Tour, attacked the main peloton early on.
The bunch allowed them to go up the road and by the 25km mark the trio had built a 4:05 lead.
It continued to grow to almost eight minutes but that was their limit as the T-Mobile team of Gonchar and Rogers, helped by three of the sprinters’ teams, decided to up the pace.
From the 7:50 lead they held after just 50km of racing the leaders’ advantage began dropping shortly after the stage’s second intermediate sprint at the 72km mark, and it kept dropping as the peloton closed in.
Knees was the most stubborn of the lot, the German attacking his two other breakaway companions in the closing kilometres in a bid to go it alone.
However, each time the Milram rider was countered.
The front trio were caught in the final 5km and 2km further on Australia’s Stuart O’Grady attacked up the right-hand side.
However the CSC sprinter gained little ground and was soon swallowed up as the sprinters’ teams jostled for position at the front.
In the home straight the Credit Agricole team of Norwegian Thor Hushovd dropped back as Quick Step’s Boonen and Milram sprinter Zabel pulled slightly ahead of the bunch.
However, both sprinters appeared to peak too early and Freire kept watch patiently until making his move in the final 30m.
Davitamon sprinter McEwen, who has won three stages in the race so far, made a stunning manoeuvre, pulling wildly out to his left and powering ahead to miss victory by the breadth of a wheel rim. — AFP
