| | By Fred Rodriguez
Special to ABC Sports Online
American cyclist Fred Rodriguez is riding for the Italian Mapei team -- ranked the number one team in the world for the past three years. In just his fifth year riding professionally, Rodriguez won the US Professional Championships in Philadelphia on June 4. Throughout the Tour de France, Rodriguez will take you through his first Tour de France -- sharing with you the ins and outs of the world's preeminent cycling event.
VILLENEUVE-SUR-LOT, France -- Just like every other day of the Tour so far, Saturday's stage amazed me. Things started so fast; I think we covered the first 100 kilometers at an average of over 50 kph, which is unreal.
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There was a breakaway right at the start of Stage Eight. |
Team Rabobank was on the attack right off the gun. I think our team ran a smarter race from the beginning, though, because we had two of our main riders, Daniele Nardello and Paolo Bettini, in the breakaway. We kind of put U.S. Postal on the defensive because they were forced to do a lot of chasing. I think it really took a lot out of them.
After the first 50k, we were averaging about 55 kph, which is crazy. Everybody was just going for it full force. I was doing my best to try and cover as many moves as I could. Finally, around the 80k mark, a group of about 15 riders broke away, and our team didn't have anyone in there. Our team director decided to go on a chase. At that point, however, a lot of us were pretty tired, so we kind of thought we wouldn't accomplish anything by chasing.
We then decided to go on the offensive and keep on tacking. We thought maybe it would initiate another group to come across. Somehow, I happened to break away myself, about one minute and a half or so. We were just flying at this point. Two other guys jumped across, one of them was Michael Sandstod from Jack & Jones, and he asked me if I thought we could make it across. I told him that we should give it some time and see what happens.
We kept riding and riding, and we weren't closing anything. My team car approached me and they said they weren't sure if I could make it across at that point. But he came back a couple minutes later and told us that we were like eight minutes ahead of the field, and if I was committed to it, to just go for it.
The other riders and me had a little discussion, and we decided to give everything we had for the next 10k and see if we could make it across. It was our only chance, because if we were to wait any longer, we would have just killed ourselves out there and ended up in no man's land.
So we just rode through the feed zone and we caught up on the next hill. I didn't think it would happen, so when we did it, other riders approached us later on just amazed that we'd made it across at that pace. One of my teammates told me that a bunch of the riders were placing bets on whether we would make it or not, so it felt great to do it.
After the break, my team ran pretty conservatively, so we weren't very cohesive. Towards the end, I was pretty surprised that the tack started so far from the finish -- I think the first tack happened about 35k out. I was hoping it would come down to a group sprint, so I was just trying to cover and stay at the front. It just happened that Dekker made a big surge with about 25k to go. When he pulled away, we all kind of looked around and hesitated, and no one was willing to make a pull and catch Dekker. Everyone was just trying to get across on their own.
A few guys made a small surge with about 10k to go and they held up well. I remained in the group and won the group sprint at the end to take fourth. | |
ALSO SEE
Tour de France results
Dekker takes Tour's 8th stage; Armstrong looms
Rodriguez grabs American spotlight for a day
Lance relaxed so far
Rodriguez Diary No. 4
Rodriguez Diary No. 3
Rodriguez Diary No. 2
Rodriguez Diary No. 1
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