Allesandro Petacchi won the final stage of theTour of Britain in Liverpool today to seal a hat-trick of stage wins on this year’s race, but it was Geoffroy Lequartre ( Agritubel) who took the big prize. The Frenchman came home safely in the pack to win the general classification, and the yellow jersey, from Steve Cummings (Great Britain). The Briton started the day with a six second deficit on Lequartre but could take back no more than a second . The other competions were won by: Matthew Goss (CSC Saxo Bank) who took the points title; Edvald Boasson Hagen (Columbia) – the sprint crown; and Danilo Di Luca (LPR Brakes) king of the mountains. Today’s stage started with an audacious break by Tyler Hamilton (Rock Racing) after the first kilometre, he built up a 16 second lead and was soon joined by Magnus Backstedt (Columbia), but the pair could not escape the the gravitational pull of the peloton and were easily swept up. Russell Downing (Pinarello RT-Candi TV), Backstedt (Columbia), and Malcolm Elliot (Pinarello RT-Candi TV) then broke after 29Km and quickly put two minutes into the chasing pack. However, it was not enough and the trio were caught on the run in to Liverpool with Olympic hero Bradley Wiggins making a surprise move to the front on the final lap of the city-centre circuit. Petacchi was not to be denied though and timed his sprint perfectly to take the stage win from Julian Dean (Garmin Chipotle) with Robbie Hunter (Barloworld in third spot). Overall the organisers of this year’s Tour of Britain can give themselves a pat on the back for a well organised race with a strong field, which was also genuinely competitive – for the first time in it’s short history. The only negative was that British crowds were denied the chance to see Tour de France sprint hero Mark Cavendish in action. Not to say that we weren’t treated to some top-class sprinting but it would have spiced things up even more had Cavendish been in the mix. The young sprinter would surely have won some stages and been in contention for the sprint or points jerseys – instead he opted to ride in the Tour of Missouri, where he won three stages. Maybe next year. Tour of Britain Stage eight results:? 1 A Petacchi (Ita) LPR Brakes-Ballan, 2hrs 19mins 25secs? 2 J Dean (NZ)Garmin-Chipotle, same time? 3 R Hunter (SA) Barloworld, same time? 4 M Goss (Aus) CSC-Saxo Bank, same time? 5 R Hayles (GB) Great Britain, same time? 6 C Sutton (Aus) Garmin-Chipotle, same time? 7 R Hammond (GB) Columbia, same time? 8 J Van Heerden (SA) MTN Energade, same time? 9 R Downing (GB) Pinarello RT-Candi TV, same time? 10 K Lisabeth (Bel) SKT An Post M.Donnelly, same time Final general classification:? 1 G Lequatre (Fra) AGR Agritubel, 27hr 21mins 49secs ?2 S Cummings (GB) Barloworld, at 5secs? 3 I Stannard (GB) Great Brtain, at 14secs? 4 D Martin (Ire) Garmin-Chipotle 27h22’04" at 15secs? 5 G Bosisio (Ita) LPR Brakes-Ballan, at 16secs ?6 B De Schrooder (Bel) SKT An Post M.Donnelly, at 20secs ?7 D Fleeman (GB) SKT An Post M.Donnelly, at 25secs? 8 F Veuchelen (Bel) TSV Topsport Vlaanderen, at 29secs ?9 E Berges (Fra) AGR Agritubel, at 50secs? 10 R Downing (GB) Pinarello RT-Candi TV, at 1min 25secs
Tour of Britain Stage 8: Petacchi takes stage, but Lequartre wins the overall
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... and we still had apostrophe rationing.
@Rendel Harris There was a bit in the bicycle hating Guardian, a nice little read, part of his justification was to acclimatise to the heat and humidity, which if he was in a better car might have been worth it. Good luck to him, chapeau.
@SecretSam That's not really fair, in fact not fair at all. It wasn't his fault that the last two mountain stages were shortened and on the first one he had dropped everyone and was a minute clear as he summitted the Iseran when the stage was neutralised, and on the second he stayed with or dropped all the other GC contenders. You seem to have forgotten his Giro win as well as Paris Nice and the Tour de Suisse. Only the fourth rider to have won the Tour and Giro before the age of twenty-five. Yes he probably couldn't have stayed with Pogacar even if he hadn't had the awful crash, and probably nor could any other rider in history except perhaps Merckx.
@lesterama Bernal has had two whammys. His crash, which he has probably never fully recovered from and Ineos taking a nosedive. They have no focus and no identity.
@Zermattjohn Read the comment I posted about my experience
I bought some Challenge Strada tyres. After a while the sidewalls began to detach from the tyre and the tread became rippled making them unsafe to use. The shop I bought them from asked me to drop them in and he would show the Challenge rep as he was due in the following week. The rep bizarrely firstly claimed that the tyres had failed because they may have been punctured (they hadn’t), then immediately claimed that they had failed because the rear tyre was more worn than the front! I emailed pictures to Challenge and was told they had failed because they had been fitted incorrectly. The black strip they had introduced to stop the issue I had was supposed to be above the rim. Which it clearly was shown to be correct on the pictures I sent to them which proved that the tyres were correctly fitted. This seems to be the norm now in the cycle industry, if there is an issue with a product, the company automatically blames the end user rather than look to address the issue, thereby pissing the customer off. A pissed off customer rarely returns.
@kingleo And there are hundreds, if not thousands of people holding up a shattered helmet saying it saved their life, the doctor/policeman told me.
I spend a month most years in China because of family, and a cargo bike there with an electric motorbike style front end and either LFP or advanced lead acid batteries, costs under £100 and is the backbone of every trade. There are a hundred different kinds but what they share in common is functionality and cheapness. Even the ancient pedal pulled wooden wagons with literally welded spokes from the sixties have been electrified with e-motors attached to the underside - and they cost sod all. In China cheap transport for business is a public good like drinking water. Because to get people to work you have to make work affordable. That's a secret of capitalism we in the UK could do better to learn.
@Zermattjohn handmade genuinely means handmade with Challenge. You cannot compare ride quality of a mass produced, vulcanized Panaracer tyre with these. The ride quality is incredibly supple, and can transform a riding experience. More expensive yes, but worth every penny!
@SecretSam 2019 Tour (don't see anyone else putting their hand up to say they won it), 2021 Giro, 2019 Paris-Nice, 2019 Tour de Suisse, 2018 Tour of California. So I'd say Lesterama is about right with his burned bright comment.