German specialist takes consolation for disappointing race so far, but Bradley Wiggins takes the yellow jersey
Tony Martin (HTC-Highroad) took a resounding victory in the third stage time trial of the Critérium du Dauphiné in the city of Grenoble. The victory should be some consolation for the German champion against the clock, who has had a disappointing race so far.
His early start affording him some of the best conditions on a rain affected day, Martin was fastest over all the time checks to complete the 42.5km course in 55’28”.
"I found a good rhythm from the start and it all went really well," said Martin afterwards. "It was a good test for me, and I'm feeling very confident now for the Tour de France time trial, too."
"Of course there will be some other top names there but hopefully I'll be going a little bit faster, too," he added.
After a disappointing first few days of the race, Martin had slumped to 131st overall, more than ten minutes down, but his performance in the time trail shows him that his form is coming on as he approaches the Tour de France.
"This win means a lot for me because it shows that step by step my build-up for July is going well," explained the German. "I've had four weeks of no races so the first few days of racing here were really hard for me, but now I'm feeling really good."
Second place on the stage was Bradley Wiggins (Team Sky); the British champion matched Martin’s time at the second checkpoint, but wet roads on the descent to the finish saw him ride a circumspect final sector to finish 11 seconds down. Wiggins’ Sky teammate Edvald Boasson Hagen was third on the stage, having also missed the worst of the conditions with a relatively early start.
The course covered the exact route of that stage 20 of next month’s Tour de France; the chance to check out the route properly, under race conditions, is one of the reasons for the number of top riders at the race.
The first time of any note was recorded by Adriano Malori (Lampre-ISD), who was the twenty-first rider to start. The 2008 World under-23 time trial champion is clearly aiming for the Italian championships, which, with defending champion Marco Pinotti (HTC-Highroad) out for a few months following his crash in the Giro d’Italia, the Lampre-ISD rider will be one of the big favourites for.
Malori finished in a time of 57’31”, which looked like it would stand for a long time.
Malori’s time was to stand for less than half an hour though, for Martin, who has had a disappointing race so far, flew around the hilly course; the German posted by far the best time at all of the intermediate checkpoints and posted a finish time of 55’28”, more than two minutes faster than Malori.
Newly re-crowned US champion Dave Zabriskie (Garmin-Cervélo) started just a few minutes behind Martin. Captain America was just unable to match the German’s time though; he was 17 seconds slower after 15km, 35 seconds slower at the top of the long climb at 27.5km, and went on to finish 58 seconds down in provisional second place.
The top three was to remain static for quite some time until Edvald Boasson Hagen (Team Sky), the 85th to start, went 15 seconds faster than Zabriskie and slot into second place. The Norwegian had been marginally slower than the US champion at both the intermediate checks, but managed to save enough power to overtake him in the closing kilometres.
Once again, with such strong riders starting so early in the race, no one looked like challenging the supremacy of the top three for some time, particularly as heavy rain was now falling on the riders in the middle of the order.
Another rider not experiencing the strong Dauphiné that was expected, Robert Gesink (Rabobank) was forced to put up with some of the worst conditions. At the top of the climb he was 2’32” down on Martin, but managed to pull something out on the final sector and only lost a further 16 seconds.
As the top men started their races the rain began to fall again. Best of the podium men at the first checkpoint was third-place Bradley Wiggins (Team Sky), who went through just 21 seconds slower than Martin.
Second-place Jurgen Van Den Broeck (Omega Pharma-Lotto) and race leader Alexandre Vinokourov (Astana) were having less of a good time though, losing 1’30” and 1’21” respectively to Martin; crucially though, they were both losing big time to Wiggins.
The conditions didn’t seem to be affecting Cadel Evans (BMC Racing), who shot past two-minute man Nicolas Roche (AG2R La Mondiale) shortly before the second checkpoint. The Australian was still 1’20 slower that Martin at this point though, with Wiggins still to go through.
Despite the rain, Wiggins seemed to be getting faster and, as he passed through the second check at 27.5km he had equalled Martin’s time. The descent back to Grenoble was wet though, and the British champion was taking care on the numerous corners as he made his way down.
As they passed through the second check, Van Den Broeck and Vinokourov were now 2’28” and 2’11” behind Wiggins, who was now firmly in the provisional yellow jersey.
Defending champion Janez Brajkovic (RadioShack) managed to ride a consistent race, getting steadily faster after his 13th place at the first checkpoint, to finish in provisional fourth place, just 1’17” behind Martin.
Evans crossed the line in a time of 56’48”, to take a provisional fifth place. The Australian was just a few seconds ahead of Roche but, having been caught for two minutes, the Irishman slumped to provisional 40th place, 3’31” behind Martin’s best time so far.
Next to finish was Wiggins, right on the tail of Evans and Roche; the wet roads on the descent had taken their toll on the Englishman’s time though and he had lost a little time to Martin in the closing sector. The British champion’s time of 55’38” was eleven seconds outside Martin’s, but was good enough for second place and was clearly far better than his rivals in the overall classification.
Van Den Broeck, clad in a red and white polka dot skinsuit, as he leads the mountains classification, crossed the line in a time of 58’07”, good enough for provisional 16th place. He lost 2’39” to Martin and, more importantly, 2’28” to Wiggins, but the time marks a significant improvement compared to his disappointing performance in the Tour de France last year.
Finally, Vinokourov crossed the line in 57’46”, good enough to take 14th place on the stage but, crucially, not good enough to hold on to his yellow jersey.
Wiggins’ performance puts the Team Sky rider into the yellow jersey with a comfortable lead over Evans, who also leapfrogs both Van Den Broeck and Vinokourov; Brajkovic moves up to third overall and Vinokourov slips to fourth.
With the mountains on the horizon, though, and with three summit finishes in the last three days of the race, Wiggins will be under a lot of pressure to hold on to his race lead.