The sixth Tour de Georgia began Monday with a short and — for Toyota-United — sweet stage from Tybee Island into Savannah. Ivan Dominguez battled his way through the well-orchestrated lead-outs of Gerolsteiner and High Road to take a commanding sprint win on the 70.4-mile flat stage ahead of Jelly Belly’s Nic Sanderson and Gerolsteiner’s Robert Förster.

“With 2K to go I had my guys in front of me: [Ivan] Stevic, Henk [Vogels] and Dominque [Rollin],” Dominguez said. “I was telling them to keep it calm, that we go at the right time. At 1K Henk went, and at the same time [George] Hincapie went. So Henk got right on his wheel. At 500 meters Dominque went, and I was on him. He was going so fast I thought I would have a hard time coming around.

“At 200 meters I went. I knew the Jelly Belly boy was behind me.”

The Jelly Belly boy was Australian Nic Sanderson, who medaled twice at the 2002 world junior championships (silver in the team pursuit, bronze in the road race).

Sanderson said the slight rise in the final kilometer — plus the pace set by the sprinters' teams — blew up the field.

“In the last K the field split all over,” Sanderson said. “I jumped on the back of Dominguez at 300 meters, but wasn’t to come over the top of him.”

Sanderson is in his first year with Jelly Belly. After two years of riding with the Australian national team, his career had a bit of a false start in 2005 when he signed for Davitamon-Lotto. Soon after, he was diagnosed with mild case of epilepsy, he said, and the team terminated his contract. He returned to track racing in Europe, then went back to racing with the Australian squad for 2007, before connecting with Jelly Belly.

“I’m really happy to be here in America,” said Sanderson, who will now be looking to defend the sprinter’s jersey as long as possible into the race.

Sleepy start

The peloton rolls out of Tybee Beach.

Photo: Casey B. Gibson

The day began on the coast in the quiet tourist town of Tybee Island, just east of Savannah. With a start just feet from the sandy beach, the entire peloton seemed relaxed before the race.

“After a wet Tour of California, to come here and race under blue skies is fantastic,” said race director Jim Birrell.

After a quick jaunt over some bridges and across marshlands, the racing began on the mainland.

Greg Henderson (High Road) took the first intermediate sprint ahead of Tyler Farrar (Slipstream-Chipotle) and Stevic. Farrar took the second sprint and, with time bonuses of three, two and one seconds available at each intermediate competition, moved himself up five seconds ahead of most of the pack and into the virtual yellow jersey. (Unfortunately for Farrar, an untimely flat with 3km to go would remove him from the picture.)

A short-lived 13-man move that included Victor Hugo Peña (Rock Racing), Tom Danielson (Slipstream-Chipotle), Chris Horner (Astana) and Bobby Julich (CSC) never managed to get a lot of traction. Perhaps the move had a little too much horsepower to let the peloton forget a dangerous break that defined the 2007 Tour de Georgia within the first days of that race. The escapees were pulled back and a few other moves came to naught. Finally, a six-man group finally escaped the vigilant bunch. The break — Frank Pipp (Health Net-Maxxis), Garrett Peltonen (Bissell), Scott Nydam (BMC), Stevic, Christian Meier (Symmetrics) and Bernard Van Ulden (Jelly Belly) — established a maximum a gap of just over a minute in the latter half of the race.

Nydam featured prominently at the Amgen Tour of California, where he took the KOM jersey and helped his BMC squad secure the most aggressive team award. He explained why he was back on the attack today.

“Our program is spread thin between Europe and here,” said Nydam, who has only raced at the Redlands Bicycle Classic since the Tour of California. “These opportunities here in North America don’t come that often, so you’ve got to make sure you make things happen.”

Nydam was awarded the most aggressive jersey on the day for his efforts. He lives in Santa Rosa, California, near Levi Leipheimer, who has been training with the BMC rider. “[Levi] has been very welcoming in helping me figure out how to be a professional cyclist,” Nydam said. “I didn’t start racing bikes until 25, so I had to learn quick. I couldn’t script a better scenario for myself.”

Meier took the final sprint from Stevic and Peltonen as the field began cranking up the chase, with Astana, Gerolsteiner, Slipstream-Chipotle and High Road driving. At High Road director Allan Peiper’s suggestion, the four teams agreed to keep it all together.

The break split in two under the pressure of the pursuit and a series of attacks, and both halves were reeled in as Rock Racing took the front, working for Fred Rodriguez.

In the final few kilometers Gerolsteiner, Rock Racing and High Road all came forward to position their sprinters. Toyota-United tucked carefully in, and delivered their man right on time.

Dominguez’s teammate Stevic seemed happier at the win than Dominguez. Knee troubles had sidelined the world B champion until Georgia. His post-race reaction: “Happy, happy, happy.”

“It’s been hard for me,” he said, “but when we do like this, nothing is hard, just a smile on our faces.”