THIS WEEK IN PRO CYCLING
Landis smokes ITT, sets up Georgia showdown with Danielson
For the second time in two years the battle for supremacy at the Tour de Georgia is setting up as a showdown between Americans Floyd Landis and Tom Danielson after they vaulted into the top two places in the overall standings by finishing 1-2 in the Stage 3 individual time trial on Thursday.
Just as in 2005, Landis (Phonak) was the fastest man, posting a blazing 54:14 on the technical 24.8-mile trip from Chickamauga over the border to Chattanooga, Tennessee. Danielson (Discovery Channel) was a close second, just four seconds back, with David Zabriskie (CSC) completing the sweep for the Americans, taking third at 0:24.
"This was quite a bit longer this year," said Landis of the stage that was nearly 15 minutes longer that the Tour de Georgia’s 2005 time trial and included the steep climb up Lookout Mountain. "There was a few hard climbs and that makes it difficult. But mostly it’s the last 20 minutes that make it a whole different race. You need to pace yourself. I think I went a little too hard in the beginning, but I made the best of it at the end. It worked out all right."
The final standings in the TT mirror the new overall standings, which have Landis first, four seconds ahead of Danielson, followed by Zabriskie at 0:24. Nathan O’Neill (Health Net-Maxxis) is fourth at 0:55, with Phonak’s Jose Enrique Gutierrez fifth at 1:22.
Stage 2 winner Yaroslav Popovych (Discovery Channel) was ninth in the TT, at 1:53, dropping him out of the race lead and into sixth overall, at 1:37.
The big question now is whether Landis' slim lead will hold up during the Stage 5 trip to the top of the hors categorie Brasstown Bald climb. In 2005, Landis came in with a one-minute lead over Danielson, but gave it all back, plus nine seconds more, as Danielson sailed to the stage win and eventually the overall title.
"We have a strong team," said Landis at Thursday’s post-race press conference inside the Chattanooga Visitors Bureau. "Last year we had the same result in the time trial, and my team did a good job in controlling the race. I got beat on Brasstown Bald, but not because the team wasn’t strong enough. I just got beat straight up. Hopefully we can control the race again and make the best of it on Brasstown Bald. It’s only a few seconds. It’s not going to be easy."
Asked what he might do differently, Landis had a simple strategy.
"Hopefully I’ll win. That would be the best thing I could do different," he said. "But there’s a lot of strong riders and it’s not easy to control. If we can start the climb at the bottom together that gives us the best opportunity. My team will do the best they can to keep it together and then it’s up to me."
Landis added that the absence of Lance Armstrong this year has little bearing on his mindset.
"It doesn’t change the way the race works at all," said Landis, who watched the seven-time Tour winner help lead Danielson to the stage win last year on Brasstown, then turn and mock Landis as he struggled to hold on to third place overall.
"Obviously Lance and I had our little differences but things are fine now. I saw him yesterday and said hello. Things are fine. What happened last year didn’t affect the outcome of the race any. I don’t get motivated by those kind of things." Before racers head up Brasstown, they will have to deal with Friday's tough Stage 4, which includes four rated climbs. Three of those climbs come in the last 48 miles of the 118.9-mile stage from Dalton to Dahlonega. The toughest is the category 2 ascent of Wolf Pen Gap, which starts about 92 miles into the stage.
Thursday's time trial was about as tough as they come. Besides a grinding climb that neared 18 percent at points, riders had to deal with a technical, twisting downhill that would give Ferraris fits. Before the race, Zabriskie went so far as to call it the toughest time-trial course he'd ever ridden. After the descent it was a long, flat run to the finish in Chattanooga - the first time in four years that the Tour de Georgia has left its namesake state.
Many of the riders came out early on Thursday to scout the course, including Danielson and his Discovery teammates, who drove in a night earlier.
"Today was really difficult," said Danielson, who will jet off to Italy for final Giro d’Italia preparations as soon as racing in Georgia is done.
"When it’s hilly like that it’s not necessarily good for a climber because time trials are a sustained effort and require you to put out a lot of power for a long period of time. For a little climber like me, sometimes that’s a little difficult, to wrestle the bike over the steep climbs.
"I haven’t done a lot of time trials but it was one of the most challenging I’ve done. I’ve never done one that was 54 minutes. It required a lot of focus."
Landis wasn’t willing go as far as his peers, but conceded that any time trial of that length is a solid barometer of fitness.
"I don’t know [if scouting the course] was critical," said Landis, who also did a morning reconnaissance mission on Thursday. "There was only a few turns really that you needed to know on the downhills. The rest of it was pretty straightforward.
"It always helps to know when there are difficult turns. But there were only a few that were dangerous. It may have looked worse but you could go full speed through them."
Race notes
During Friday’s Stage 5 trip from Dalton to Dahlonega, riders will sport green bar tape on their bikes in a show of support for Dalton native Saul Raisin. Raisin (Crédit Agricole) was badly injured in a crash at the Circuit de la Sarthe in western France, and is still in the hospital. Raisin won the Best Young Rider jersey at the 2003 Tour de Georgia.
Health Net-Maxxis TT man Nathan O’Neill couldn’t hide his frustration on Thursday after finishing just one place off the podium. "I am getting so tired of finishing fourth and fifth, right off the podium. What have you got to do?" he lamented. "It’s the same suspects every single time. I came up here one day about 10 days ago, I drove over it once and rode over it once. I think I knew it better than most people." Despite the extra prep time, the Aussie felt like he’d performed below par on Thursday. "I’m not making excuses, but I didn’t feel like I had a real good day today," he said. "If I had got on the podium today I probably wouldn’t have honestly felt like I deserved it. It wasn’t a podium-worthy kind of ride. For some reason I just felt average. I didn’t hurt, but I never felt like I was on it. I purposely held back before the climb. I wanted to measure myself and then really nail it from the top of the climb to the finish. I stuck to that plan, I think that’s the way to do it, but I just needed a little bit extra."
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