Big sprint battle expected at 2.HC race
Sprint rivals Tyler Farrar, Alessandro Petacchi, André Gripel, Andrea Guardini, Kenny Van Hummel and Allan Davis will have a real head-to-head this month in the Presidential Tour of Turkey, enabling them to see precisely how they compare to each other in the run up to the Grand Tours.
Thanks to a two week delay in the date of running the event, a higher standard field is anticipated for this year’s edition of the race, which will begin on Sunday April 24th. The new timeslot enables those who rode the Northern Classics to have sufficient recovery, while also syncing with the programme of those building up for the Giro d’Italia
In all, six ProTeams will take part. They are Farrar’s Garmin-Cervélo, Greipel’s Omega Pharma Lotto, Petacchi’s Lampre-ISD, Davis’ Astana, Liquigas-Cannondale (including Elia Viviani, Jacopo Guarnieri), and the Saxo Bank SunGard team of entrants Gustav Larsson and Jaroslaw Marycz.
There will also be 14 Pro Continental teams, as well as two new Continental teams from Turkey: Team Manisaspor and Konya-Torku Seker Spor-Vivelo.
The Pro Continental teams including the Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli team of Guardini, who in his debut pro season has already clocked up five stage wins in the Tour de Langkawi and one in the Tour of Qatar. The 21 year old is regarded as the most exciting young sprinter on the block, and will be keen to notch up another win or two in the 2.HC-ranked event. His team-mate Giovanni Visconti won last year, and so the team know what it takes to succeed in the race.
General classification contenders tipped by the organisers as their favourites for the overall win include Larsson, talented young American rider Andrew Talansky (Garmin-Cervélo), Nicolas Vogondy (Cofidis), Sandy Casar and Anthony Roux (FDJ), Francesco Ginanni (Androni Gioccatoli), Canadian time trial specialist Svein Tuft (Spidertech) and Tadej Valjavec (Manisaspor).
The race begins on Sunday April 24 with a 121 kilometre stage starting and finishing in Istanbul. The most difficult leg will be stage four from Marmaris to Pamukkale, where the GC contenders will slug it out over 209 kilometres. Aside from being mountains, the stage is also the second longest of the race, with only the fifth leg to Fethiye exceeding this distance.
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2011 Presidential Tour of Turkey (2.HC):
Stage 1: Istanbul-Istanbul, 121km, Sunday 24 April
Stage 2: Kusadasi-Tugurgreis, 181km, Monday 25 April
Stage 3: Bodrum-Marmaris, 166km, Tuesday 26 April
Stage 4: Marmaris-Pamukkale, 209km, Wednesday 27 April
Stage 5: Denizli-Fethiye, 221km, Thursday 28 April
Stage 6: Fethiye-Finike, 191km, Friday 29 April
Stage 7: Tekirova-Manangat, 135km, Saturday 30 April
Stage 8: Side-Alanya, 160km, Sunday 1st May
Teams and chief riders:
Team Garmin-Cervélo (Tyler Farrar, Andrew Talansky)
Omega Pharma-Lotto (Andre Greipel)
Saxo Bank-Sungard (Gustav Larsson, Jaroslaw Marycz)
Team Astana (Allan Davis, Assan Bazayev)
Lampre-ISD (Alessandro Petacchi)
Liquigas-Cannondale (Elia Viviani, Jacopo Guarnieri)
Cofidis (Nicolas Vogondy, Damien Monier)
FDJ (Sandy Casar, Anthony Roux)
Colnago-CSF (Manuel Belleti, Sasha Modolo)
Androni-Giocattoli (Francesco Ginnani)
Farnese Vini-Neri Sottoli (Andrea Guardini, Oscar Gatto)
Team Netapp (Eric Baumann)
De Rosa-Ceramica Flaminia (Michele Merlo)
Andalucia-Caja Granada (Juan-Jose Lobato)
Spidertech (Svein Tuft, Kevin Lacombe)
Caja Rural (Aïtor Galdos)
Skil-Shimano (Kenny Van Hummel, Mitchell Docker)
Verandas Willems-Acccent (Stefan Van Dijk, Jürgen Van Goolen)
Team Type 1 (Rubens Bertogliati, Jure Kocjan)
Colombia es Pasion (Victor-Hugo Pena, Juan-Pablo Forero)
Team Manisaspor (Tadej Valjavec, Jeremy Yates)
Konya-Torku Seker Spor-Vivelo (Danial Andonov Petrov, Eyup Karagöbek)