Sanchez wins stage 8, while Nocentini earns another day in yellow
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Caisse d'Epargne's Luis Leon Sanchez won Saturday's second day in the Pyrenees, a 176-km romp from Andora back into France for the start of the race's second week.
Sanchez was part of a nearly day-long break that shook down to just four men rolling into Saint Girons. He smartly monitored a late attack by Ag2r's Vladimir Efimkin and benefited from Sandy Casar's too-early jump to take a solid win less than two minutes ahead of the main field.
All the overall favorites finished together, and Rinaldo Nocentini held his overall lead with the implicit blessing of Astana, which controlled the field much of the day, allowing a break of non-GC contenders to form. Nocentini's French team, Ag2r, contributed a bit to the chase and paced the leader back to the main chase group when he had some difficulty on the category 1 Col d'Agnes climb.
"I began to struggle on the last climb but that's normal a day after you've been in a 200km breakaway," said Nocentini, the first Italian to wear the yellow jersey since Alberto Elli in 2000.
"It was only thanks to my team, and Stephane Goubert in particular, that I was able to get back to that group after he dragged me back up.
"He kept me in the yellow jersey."
The stage was held under ideal weather conditions and at a fast pace: the field exceeded estimated times throughout the day.
The beginning
The stage started with an immediate climb, the first category Port Envalira, and the race opened with a scattering of attacks, including a push by Cadel Evans, looking to get back into the race after a disappointing first week.
2009 Tour de France
- Stage 8: Andorre-la-Vieille to Saint-Girons
- 176.5km (110 miles)
- Stage winner: Luis Leon Sanchez (Caisse d'Epargne) in 4:31:50
- Stage winner's average speed:38.7 kph (24.1 mph)
- GC leader: Rinaldo Nocentini (Ag2r)
- Points leader: Thor Hushovd
- Climbing leader:Christopher Kern, Cofidis
- Team GC leader: Ag2r
- Best young rider: Tony Martin (Columbia-HTC)
- Stage wins/GC leaders
- Stage 1 (ITT): Fabian Cancellara/Cancellara
- Stage 2: Mark Cavendish/Cancellara
- Stage 3: Cavendish/Cancellara
- Stage 4 (TTT): Astana/Cancellara
- Stage 5: Thomas Voeckler/Cancellara
- Stage 6: Thor Hushovd/Cancellara
- Stage 7: Brice Feillu/Rinaldo Nocentini
- Up Next:
- Stage 9, from Saint-Gaudens to Tarbes, is a 160.5km (99.7 mile) trek that includes the first category Col d'Aspin and the hors categorie Col du Tourmalet, which comes at mid-race. After the Tourmalet, the race begins a 70km mostly downhill and flat run into Tarbes.
Evans joined a large chase group that paced behind FdJ's Sandy Casar, who got over the top of the Envalira first, with less than two minutes' lead over the favorites, including yellow jersey Rinaldo Nocentini and Astana's leading men.
The middle
On the long descent, Evans dropped back soon after a tense discussion with Fabian Cancellara, who 24 hours earlier was race leader, but who started Saturday at a relatively anonymous position, 5:37 back, wearing his Swiss road champion's red jersey. Soon, a more viable breakaway of ten riders coalesced.
The break:
- Thor Hushovd (Cervelo)
- Fabian Cancellara (Saxo Bank)
- Juan Antonio Flech (Rabobank)
- Mikel Astarloza (Euskaltel-Euskadi)
- George Hincapie (Columbia)
- Vladimir Efimkin (Ag2r)
- Sandy Casar (Francaise des Jeux)
- Luis Leon Sanchez (Caisse d'Epargne)
- Sébastien Rosseler (Quick Step)
- Mikhail Ignatiev (Katusha)
Points chase
Sanchez was the best-placed in the break, at 4:10 behind Nocentini, but Hushovd perhaps had the most to gain: the stage 6 winner snagged two intermediate sprints to take the green-jersey lead away from Mark Cavendish, who was not among the leaders over the first summit, although he did rejoin the yellow jersey group before the start of the next climb. Cavendish's teammate Hincapie grabbed the second place points at both the intermediate sprints to minimize the damage to Cav's points position.
Hushovd dropped off the breakaway before the day's middle climb, the Col de Port.
The polka-dot jersey contest also was a motivator within the break; Caser took top points on the day's first two climbs.
Approaching the final climb, the first category Col d'Agnes, the leading eight had just two minutes' lead over the Astana and Ag2r-led peloton. As the slope steepened, Andy Schleck attacked the peloton, marked by Astana's lead men, Garmin's Christian Vande Velde and most of the other favorites. Nocentini, however, was not able to match the acceleration, but he clawed his way back to the leader before the summit.
Up front, Astarloza, Efimkin and Sanchez led over d'Agnes with 2:40 over the chase. Casar rejoined the three on the descent, but Hincapie could not close the gap, and rejoined the yellow jersey group.
The end
Astana controlled the field in the final 40km, apparently content to allow the break (which had no GC threats left) to succeed and for Nocentini to retain the lead.
Efimkin, who could claim he was present in the break only to protect the interests of his team leader Nocentini, sat in for much of the final kilometers, and was the first to attack, with less than 5km to go. He maintained a narrow gap on the other three, who trade pace to chase desperately, finally catching in the last half kilometer, when Casar was the first to counterattack.
But Sanchez timed his effort perfectly, sweeping into Casar's draft briefly before jumping with about 200 meters to go to take the win.
"I knew that Efimkin was going to have no choice but to attack. He's one of my former teammates," said Sanchez.
"I tried to get Astarloza and Casar to take relays. All I needed was a bit of luck, but I knew that I had the speed to beat them."
Race Note
Sanchez' teammate Oscar Pereiro, the Tour de France winner in 2006, abandoned the race on Saturday, as did compatriot Eduardo Gonzalo (Agritubel).
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