Boonen's Charity Event

Boonen returns for charity cyclo-cross race

(http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/boonen-returns-for-charity-cyclo-cross-race)

Tom Boonen will once again host the charity cyclo-cross race "Boonen & Friends" at the Zilvermeer in Mol, Belgium this Saturday. The event benefits "Move to Improve", a charity for children with movement disorders. Joining the Quick Step sprinter will be former cyclo-cross world champion Lars Boom who will be given a one-minute handicap to the star-studded field of road professionals.

Boom will be up against a field of 48 riders which includes, among others, former winners Maarten Wynants and Pieter Vanspeybrouck as well as current professionals André Greipel, Jelle Vanendert, Giovanni Visconti, Carlos Barredo, Björn Leukemans, Marco Bandiera and Christian Knees.

In the race for retired pros, another former world champion, Erwin Vervecken, will try to defend his title of last year against the likes of Johan Museeuw, Davide Bramati, Eric Vanderaerden, Jo Planckaert and Marc Wauters.

The race is sure to provide even Boom and Vervecken with challenges on a course which Boonen called one of the hardest yet. "Even for a cyclo-crosser the circuit is technically challenging."

Boonen is looking forward to racing for the first time since he crashed out of the Vuelta a España with a broken wrist.
""My wrist is almost healed. I only suffer when I have to ride a long descent."

After a series of community races, the ex-professionals will take to the start at 2pm, with Boonen and friends going off at 3:15.

2011 Tour de France, Stage 14

Stage 14 runs 168km, from Saint-Gaudens to Plateau de Beille. Today's stage has 6 categorized climbs, including a HC finish.

Interesting Fact of the Day: This is the 5th time a stage has finished at Plateau de Beille, and the stage winner has always gone on to win the tour. Will that be the case this year?
Almost instantly Chavanel attacks and soon Voigt and Millar are going clear as well. Then there were 19 riders trying to reach Chavanel as well as others back in the peloton trying to bridge the gap. They were able to catch Chavanel, as well as other chasers who had a chance to catch the lead group. So the breakaway became: El Fares, Millar, Casar, Voigt, L. Sanchez, Izagirre, Mollema, Koren, Chavanel, Di Gregorio, Riblon, Bouet, Vichot, Gerdemann, Charteau, Quinziato, Silin, Matcato, Delage, Malori, Perez, Pineau, Zandio, and Costa. Some big names, and a lot of familiar names. The best place attacker is Casar at 21, sitting 8'47" back from Yellow.

At the summit of the first climb, Delage took the most KOM points and Mollema took second. Delage also crossed the sprint line first taking points there as well. The second summit of the day also belonged to Delage. Cavendish is off the back of the peloton having difficulty making it up the second mountain, however on the descent he caught back up.

Millar, Casar, and El Fares have upped the pace in the breakaway and soon are the leading trio. With 87km to go, they lead the peloton by 7 minutes. With 75km remaining that lead jumped another two minutes as other breakaway members are either trying to reach the trio or are being dropped on the acsent. As Leopard-Trek takes over the control of the peloton, Roy is being dropped off the back. Hushovd is also being dropped.

At the third summit of the say, this time it is Casar who takes it. On the descent, Riblon catches the trio, however, soon Millar is dropped on the ascent of the 4th climb. Silin passes Millar on his way to the new trio in the lead. As Silin gets close, the rest of the chasers are making their way back up as well. There are now 10 riders up front: El Fares, Silin, Riblon, Casar, Di Gregorio, Millar, Voigt, Charteau, Zandio, and Izagirre.

The 4th climb of the day goes to Chavanel, who just eclipsed Charteau right before the line.

There was a crash on the 4th descent. Ten Dam went down pretty hard, but he got back up and continued on.

Right away there is a category 3 ascent for the 5th climb and Izagirre takes it.

Voigt crashed on this descent, but he too was able to get back up. He crashed again a few minutes later when his wheel locked up. He is able to make his way back to his team who is leading the peloton down the mountain. Izagirre is leading with about a minute on the chasing group. L Sanchez attacked the chasing group but no one responds to help him. Then Millar tries. This is the issue with big groups; they can't work well together.

On the final climb of the day Leopard-Trek continues to keep it at a fast pace. Riders are dropping off the back, including Hincapie, Gesink, and Martin. With 13km left of the stage, most of the riders from the original breakaway had been caught with Casar still ahead. BMC is helping Leopard-Trek pace, and soon there are 20 or so riders left in the peloton.

A. Schelck attacks and Contador follows. Evans, Basso, Cunego, F. Schleck and Voeckler respond. Danielson has been gapped. A. Schelck attacks again and this time Vanenert is with him. S. Sanchez, Basso, Cunego, and Uran follow. He goes again and Evans bridges to him. This is a 12 rider group, and with 8km remaining, Casar has less than a minute lead.

With 6km left, Casar has 20 seconds but Vanenert attacks an surges past Casar. A. Schelck keep attacking his group, but he can't get anywhere. With 5km left, Vanenert has 18". Its Basso who is setting the pace, but Voeckler stays on his wheel. In the flatter section, S. Sanchez attacks and is in the middle of Vanenert and the chasers.

Basso creates a gap, and Evans, Voeckler, and Peraud bridge, but they are caught before the end. Vanenert wins the stage with S. Sanchez second.

Stage 14 Results:
1 Vanendert
2 S Sanchez
3 A Schleck
4 Evans
5 Uran
6 Contador
7 Voeckler
8 F Schleck
9 Peraud
10 Rolland

2011 Tour de France, Stage 13

Today’s stage is a short 156km from Pau to Lourdes, with only one huge climb, but three climbs total, a category 3, a category 4, and an HC.

We are down to 174 riders. There were two non-starters today: Steegmans, who was in a stage 5 crash, just found out that he fractured a wrist bone, and Galimzyanov, who finished outside the time limit yesterday. He crossed the finish line almost an hour after Sanchez!

There was an initial breakaway of two riders and five more joined them. However before any names could be announced the peloton caught them while averaging 50-60km/h!

Then there was a 15 man group, but again they couldn’t get far.

At about 122km left of the stage, Kloden abandoned. He’s been suffering since his crash yesterday, and hasn’t had time to recover. Also Isaichev threw in the towel.

Vandenert takes the most points over the top of the first climb.

There were many more attacks large groups that get swallowed back up.

Boom also abandoned today after losing over 5 minutes on the peloton.

At 90km from the finish, we finally have a stable breakaway: Tjallingii, Hushovd, Fofonov, Hagen, Pineau, Roy, Moncoutié, Petacchi, Gusev, and Bak. A lot of big names, but Gusev is the best placed rider, sitting at 28th, down 11'13". At 87km from the finsh, the breakaway had over 4 minutes.

Roy took the lone KOM point on the category 4 climb.

The leading 10 did not sprint at the intermediate sprint. Hagen took the most points, followed by Moncoutié. Rojas led the peloton across, in front of Cavendish.

After the sprint, Hushovd attacked his group. He reached a 17” lead before he was joined by Roy.  Moncoutié and Hagen formed a 2-man chase group. Back in the peloton there were a bunch of counter-attacks.

As the last climb gets steeper, riders are being dropped from the peloton: Farrar, Cavendish (who’s being helped by teammate Eisel), Cancellara, Greipel, Hoogerland, Thomas, and Chavanel. Roy has also managed to loose Hushovd, however Moncoutié has caught up and passed Hushovd on his way to Roy.

Of course Roy crossed the summit first, with Hushovd two minutes back. Hushovd caught Moncoutié on the descent. Gilbert had attacked the peloton as goes solo.

With 6km to go, Moncoutié is not helping Hushovd, so Hushovd attacks and is able to catch Roy. Moncoutié catches up and Roy can’t go anymore. Hushovd attacks again and he is the winner of Stage 13!!

Stage 13 Results:
1 Hushovd
2 Moncoutie
3 Roy
4 Bak
5 Pineau
6 Hagen
7 Gusev
8 Tjallingii
9 Petacchi
10 Gilbert

2011 Tour de France, Stage 6

Today, the bunch will leave Brittany and travel 226km to Normandy. This is the longest stage in this year's Tour de France. Today includes two category 3 climbs and one category 4 climbs before a final climb 1.5kms from the finish line. Three kilometers from the finish, there is a 1.3km long climb at 6.3 percent, a perfect place for a late attack. Then there are 1.4 km of a false uphill flat and the 400m finishing straight which is flat.

An update on the two abondons from yesterday: Brajkovic broke his collarbone due to his crash yesterday and Kern hs been dealing with ongoing knee pain and pulled out of the race.

There was another abandon today: Velasco. He has a fractured collarbone due to his crash yesterday.

Westra was the first rider today to attack. He was followed by Roux. Hoogerland, Duque, and Malori soon caught up with the breakaway. Roux is the best place man, only 2.25 minutes back on the Yellow. The maximum lead of the attack was at almost 12 minutes. However, the first hour of the race was very fast: at about 50 km/h for the first 30 km even though the weather was much less than stellar:

Hoogerland takes the first KOM points of the day: Hoogerland - 2, Roux - 1. The intermediate sprint has the following results: Roux- 20, Duque - 17, Westra - 15, Malori - 13, Hoogerland - 11, Cavendish - 10, Rojas - 9, Farrar - 8, Renshaw - 7, Gilbert - 6, Petacchi - 5, Delage - 4, Ventoso - 3, Eisel - 2, Moinard - 1. The second climb gave the following KOM points: Roux - 2, Hoogerland - 1

With 56km remaining,  Westra attacked the rest of the breakawy. Malori followed. Sixteen kilometers late the three remaining are caught by the peloton. The next set of KOM points went to Westra (2) and Malori (1).

As soon as the gap hit 30 seconds, Malori took off on his own with 17km left. With a six seconds, Malori started the last climb, but was caught soon after that.

Then Vandendert opened a gap, followed by Voeckler. But that didn't amount to anything as they were both caught before the end with Hagen taking the win!

Stage 6 Results:
1 Edvald Boasson Hagen
2 Matthew Harley Goss
3 Thor Hushovd
4 Romain Feillu
5 Jose Joaquin Rojas Gil
6 Arthur Vichot
7 Philippe Gilbert
8 Gerald Ciolek
9 Marco Marcato
10 Arnold Jeannesson

Favorite Picture of the Day:

Frank Schleck before the stage began

Note: I will not be able to post tomorrow or Saturday because I am going on vacation this weekend. I'll hopefully have time to catch back up on Sunday night with recaps of all missed stages. If not, Monday is a rest day so instead of posting another blog, I'll do recaps.