Levi Leipheimer has expressed satisfaction with his overall victory yesterday in the Tour of Utah, saying that he was psyched to win the race and that the success has set him up well for the upcoming ProTour races in Canada.
“It was a great week for me,” he said. “I was never in any trouble and I don’t think it could have gone any better. It was a great week of preparation for the ProTour races in Quebec and Montreal.”
The Team RadioShack rider started the six day race aiming to build form after what was a somewhat disappointing Tour de France for him. He finished 13th overall in the race and then went on to compete in the Clasica San Sebastian, placing 38th there.
He showed his form was on the up when he smashed Lance Armstrong’s course record in the Leadville 100, three days before the start of the Tour of Utah.
The latter event started a little slowly for him when he was just tenth in the prologue, probably due to the effects of the MTB race on his legs. However he quickly got up to speed, grabbing the race lead on stage two when he finished 51 seconds ahead of Francisco Mancebo (Canyon Bicycles) at the top of Mount Nebo.
Despite not having any team-mates in the event, Leipheimer successfully defended his lead over the remaining days. He finished one second behind Taylor Phinney (Trek-Livestrong) in the stage three time trial, finished in the bunch on the penultimate day criterium and then placed second behind Australian rider Jai Crawford (Fly V Australia) on yesterday’s final stage, which ended at the summit of Snowbird Ski Resort.
“The fact that the whole week was a hard profile, hard course, took away a lot of tactics and played into my favour,” he explained after the stage. “Today I was able to control a little bit on the climbs. When it was just Mancebo and I on the climb left, I thought, ‘well now I have to go’.
“Mancebo pulled for a long time, even before the climb, so he couldn’t stay with me, but I figured I better go. I wanted to be safe. I didn't know exactly who was up the road or how many guys. When I caught Crawford, I was safe, I was going to win the overall race. I had done a big effort to get there but there was no denying the fact that he earned the stage more than me. I think it would have been wrong to sprint him for the win.”
The 36 year old ended the race two minutes 30 seconds ahead of defending champion Mancebo. He’ll now continue his buildup for those Canadian ProTour events, which begin on September 10th with the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec will take place on Friday September 10th. That uses a circuit which winds through the centre of old Québec city and the nearby Parc des Champs du Bataille. It will total 189 kilometres and will include 3000 metres of climbing, guaranteeing plenty of action.
It will be followed two days later by the Grand Prix de Montréal, which will use much of the same circuit where Eddy Merckx won the world road race championship title in 1974. The 193.6 kilometre event will pass repeatedly through the spectacular Parc du Mont-Royal and features 2600 metres of climbing. Leipheimer is not known as a Classics rider, but the hilly nature of the races could suit him if he is in top form.