Last year’s Tour Down Under winner Allan Davis is off to a tough start with his new Astana team after being caught behind a pile-up in today’s first stage. The Australian said he would need a “big miracle” if he was to repeat his overall victory in the race. Now that he has more than eight minutes to make up on the day’s winner HTC-Columbia’s Andre Greipel the sprinter will have to look for stage wins.
“It would have to be a big miracle now but I’m not really worrying about the overall [standings]. It’s a long race, a long season and we’ll see what happens,” he told AFP.
His Astana team didn’t bring any race radios to the event, but the 29-year-old doesn’t think that would have been enough to keep him in the hunt for a win.
“They didn’t bring any [radios] over, I’m not sure why,” he said.
Davis was admittedly having an off day, and instead will look forward to his next race on home soil when the world championships come to Melbourne.
“It’s no problem, it’s one of those things, I was having a bit of a bad day as well,” he explained.
“I know the work I’ve done and where I’m at, I’m not shattered at all.”
Last year Davis was able to overcome a crash and take the overall, but 2008 champion Greipel wasn’t as lucky. That same pile-up saw him miss the early season due to injury, and along with it the chance to defend his 2008 title. After a botched leadout in the Cancer Council Helpline Classic, his HTC-Columbia team came through for the German when it mattered delivering him to the line flawlessly.
Davis managed to stay out of harms way physically despite being surrounded by today’s carnage, but it all happened at a bad time forcing him to lose contact with the attacking peloton.
“It was a bad one,” Davis said. “It was strange, we had just started to pick up speed and the next thing quarter of the peloton was on the ground all at the same time.
“The attacks had just started to go, the speed was just starting to pick up and next thing, bang, it went down.
“I just missed it and a guy took me out from behind, but I had one foot down before he hit me so it wasn’t too bad.”