Andrea Guardini wins seventh stage in 2011 47th Presidential Tour of Turkey: Cycling News
Andrea Guardini won the seventh stage of the 47th Presidential Tour of Turkey, on April 30, 2011.
The race started in Tekirova and ended at Manangat. Guradini took a total of 3 hours, 5 minute and 37 seconds to cover the distance of 138 kilometres.
Kenny Van Hummel of Skil-Shimano Team was the runner-up, while Kenny Robert of Garmin-Cervelo’s team finished in the third spot.
Stefan Van Dijk, Nacer Bouhanni and Sacha Modolo were in seventh, eighth and ninth places, respectively.
After winning the stage Guardini said, "Each of the last three sprints I've won has been nicer than the previous one: in Qatar, in Istanbul and here. I'm myself impressed by what I'm achieving. I didn't think that I'd be beating those big names after four
months as a professional rider!"
After 34 kilometres of the race, a group of 4 riders, which included Yohan Bagot of Cofidis team, Rob Goris of Willems team, Andrea Pasqualon of Colnago team and Alexander Ryabkin of Caja Rural team went clear. All of them never gained an advantage of more
than two minutes and after 33 kilometres, the four escapees were caught by the peloton.
In the final 25 kilometres, the other group of three riders, Sep Vanmarcke, Paolo Locatelli and Kirilov Tchanliev tried their luck. But Lampre-ISD team was encouraged to move Alessandro Petacchi to finish the hopes of the attackers.
When Petacchi started sprinting on the right side of the road, then Van Hummel had to do it from the left. He added that, "I did everything right, but Guardini beat me and I couldn't do anything against him. He's so strong and so fast."
Andrea Guardini was very happy after finding a gap and jumped to cross the finish line ahead of the other riders.
Alexander Efimkin was leading in the overall classification with a timing of 30 hours, 22 minutes and 49 seconds. Andrey Zeits of Pro-Astana Team was the runner-up with 1 minutes and 13 seconds behind Efimkin.
Thibaut Pinot of FDJ Team was in third place with a difference of 1 minute and 33 seconds.
The eighth and last stage of the 47th Presidential Tour of Turkey will start in Alanya, Turkey.
A quick view of the top five in the Tour of Turkey so far, is as follows;
1. Andrea Guardini (Ita) Farnese Vini - Neri Sottoli Team
2. Kenny Robert Van Hummel (Ned) Skil – Shimano Team
3. Tyler Farrar (USA) Garmin-Cervelo Team
4. André Greipel (Ger) Omega Pharma-Lotto Team
5. Alessandro Petacchi (Ita) Lampre – ISD Team
General classification after stage 7
1. Alexander Efimkin (Rus) Team Type 1 - Sanofi Aventis Team 30 hrs:22 min: 49 secs
2. Andrey Zeits (Kaz) Pro-Astana Team, 1 min: 13 secs
3. Thibaut Pinot (Fra) FDJ Team, 1 min: 33 secs
4. Thomas Peterson (USA) Garmin-Cervelo Team, 1 min: 50 secs
5. Cameron Wurf (Aus) Liquigas-Cannondale Team, 2 min: 17 secs
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