Jakob Fuglsang may have appeared to be the strongest in the two man break which decided the victory on yesterday’s seventh stage of the Critérium du Dauphiné, but the Dane has played down the significance of his defeat to Samuel Sanchez (Euskaltel Euskadi) in the finale.
The Astana rider bridged across to Sanchez just after the summit of the day’s penultimate climb, the Col du Noyer, and joined forces with him on the descent to open out an advantage over the pursuing group behind.
He then did the bulk of the work on the final climb up to the finish, with Sanchez pulling a range of agonised faces in trying to hold onto his wheel.
However apart from one jump to try to dislodge Sanchez, Fuglsang didn’t otherwise challenge his breakaway companion, who came off his wheel before the line and was clearly stronger in the sprint.
Rather than accepting any tactical naivety, though, Fuglsang points to his improvement from tenth to sixth overall in the general classification as being the reason for the way he rode.
“This was a long, hard day, but sometimes long days for me are better than short ones. Towards the end of the stage I started to feel like I had something, and so I attacked to break up the situation and get some action in the overall classification,” he said.
“Sanchez had no interest in the overall, and I needed to take as many seconds as possible, so it was up to me to put in as much work as possible. In the end he had more strength than me for the finish, but that is bike racing, and it happens more often than not.”
Fuglsang is yet to pick up a win since moving to Astana prior to the start of the season. Prior to yesterday, the closest he got was fifth on stage one of the Vuelta al Pais Vasco. On the basis of yesterday’s performance, he appears to be coming into form at the right time, and is looking good for the Tour.
“I'm really happy that our training on Tenerife is starting to bear fruit,” he confirmed. “I am feeling better every day. One more stage to get things done here at the Dauphiné, but I am very optimistic ahead of the Tour de France.”