Danish rider in driving seat with just one day remaining
Four days after he was confirmed for the Italian team for the London Olympics, Marco Pinotti underlined his improving form with a dominant win in today’s time trial at the Tour of Austria.
The five-time Italian champion was 32 seconds faster than Kristof Vandewalle (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) over the 24.1 kilometre distance, and beat the latter’s team-mate Frantisek Rabon by a further twenty seconds.
Overnight race leader Jakob Fuglsang was twelfth, one minute 15 seconds back.
Pinotti’s triumph was his second of the season after the final time trial in the Giro d’Italia. “The goal here was to win,” the BMC Racing Team rider said. “I’m only disappointed with the overall because we started with one less rider and if Johann Tschopp was here, we might have played it differently the other day. But second and sixth (overall) is good and it’s a good boost for the next races and my future goals.”
Tschopp did not start the race due to the birth of his second son this month.
While Fuglsang’s time trial was over a minute off the pace of Pinotti, he had a big buffer going into the stage and remained comfortably clear. With just one stage remaining he leads Steve Morabito (BMC Racing Team) by one minute 24 seconds, while Robert Vrecer (Team Vorarlberg) is 28 seconds further back in third.
Danilo di Luca (Acqua & Sapone) was only 46th in the test, losing almost two and a half minutes, and dropped from second to fourth overall.
Fuglsang’s RadioShack Nissan director José Azevedo said he was satisfied with the performance. “We can be happy with the results of today. Jakob did a good TT, given the completely flat course and lack of technical area,” he said. “It wasn’t the best course for him but he defended the jersey very well. He had a good rhythm and gave it his all.”
He believes that Fuglsang is very likely to win tomorrow in Vienna, but doesn’t want to jump the gun by talking of overall victory. “Normally it should be a bunch sprint so we should be able to defend the jersey well. But as long as we haven’t yet crossed the finish line, we haven’t won the race,” he said, being cautious. “It’s not looking bad, though.”
Also see: Pinotti relishing thoughts of representing Italy in the Olympic Games