The Dutch team Rabobank was able to take some positives away from the final stage of the Tour of Qatar, which saw the team’s new sprinter Mark Renshaw take third place, his best result of the young season.
Friday’s stage six in Qatar was taken out by French under-23 world champion Arnaud Démare (FDJ-BigMat), and while the stage will be remembered for the budding star’s first professional victory, it will also be remembered for the rare high speed crash suffered by Mark Cavendish (Sky Procycling), who Renshaw worked to lead out for several seasons at HTC-Highroad.
Denis Galimzyanov (Katusha) nipped Renshaw on the line for second, after the Australian sprinter was subjected to the wind too soon in the waning meters of stage six. Now without a win in the Santos Tour Down Under as well as Qatar, Renshaw will leave the Middle East and look to regroup with his lead out. But Rabobank management took some solace in the way Qatar’s final stage played out.
“The wide roads make it difficult to organize anything. We heard this from other sprinters as well,” team director Erik Dekker said of some of Qatar’s sprint finishes.
“The intention was to have Tom Leezer and Graeme Brown bring Renshaw into contention in the final kilometer, but unfortunately we didn’t have Leezer,” Dekker added. “He had to drop out with stomach problems. But even with only Graeme we thought we could [set up Renshaw].
“As they came through at the last roundabout, Graeme was at the front and Mark was four places back. It is unfortunate that it failed but I have seen things that make me optimistic for the future.”
Without the services of Leezer and with Brown dropping off with several hundred meters to race, Renshaw found himself at the head of the peloton while Démare, Galimzyanov, Cavendish and Tyler Farrar (Garmin-Barracuda) were just getting warmed up behind.
Renshaw was forced to start his sprint too early and tried to maintain it. Démare exploded past him, but that he was still nearly able to hold off Galimzyanov for second could be an indication of improving speed for Renshaw. Dekker indicated that a victory would have been most desirable, but still sounded pleased with some progress.
“It was a learning process this week and that went well,” he admitted. “But fair is fair. You are here for the [winning] result and we certainly did not get that.”
With Rabobank and the rest of the teams finished with Qatar, their attention now turns to the Tour of Oman, which begins Tuesday. For the hillier of the two Middle Eastern races, Renshaw and team-mate Jos Van Emden are out, and will be replaced by Laurens Ten Dam and Tom Jelte Slagter.
The team will hope to get back Coen Vermeltfoort, who crashed out on stage one of Qatar, as well as Leezer. Both are expected to make the February 14 start.
Rabobank leader Robert Gesink will not return to defend his 2011 title in Oman, opting instead for the Ruta del Sol, beginning on February 19th in Spain.