Christopher Horner wins fourth stage of 2011 Amgen Tour of California: Cycling News
RadioShack team's Christopher won the fourth stage and also took overall leader’s yellow jersey of 2011 Amgen Tour of California from Livermore to San Jose, on Wednesday, May 18.
The 39-year-old, Horner took a total of 3 hours, 27 minutes and 51 seconds to cover the distance of 131.6 kilometres.
Twice Tour de France runner-up, Andy Schleck, of the Leopard Trek team showed his climbing prowess and grabbed second place with 15 seconds behind Horner.
Rory Sutherland was in third place with the same timing of Andy. The three-time Tour of California Champion, Levi Leimper was in fourth place.
After winning the stage, Horner said, "He's a three-time champion, and without a doubt I was working for Levi. We figured out that on the Sierra climb if the legs are good I would go, but he's still our protected leader here, going into the time trial. He's
a big favourite there and there's some time he can pull back and we can win this thing 1-2."
Recently, Horner was in fourth place overall in Volta a Catalunya and grabbed second place overall in Vuelta al Pais Vasco. In 2010, Horner took fourth place overall in Tour of California.
The group of ten riders, including Rubens Bertogliati (Team Type 1-Sanofi Aventis), Ben Jacques-Maynes and Jeremy Vennell (Bissell Cycling), Will Routley (Team Spidertech p/b C10) and Alastair Loutit made their first break earlier in the race.
The leaders gained advantage three minutes over peloton at the first climb on Mines Road. Barta maintained his form in the race and won the first KOM sprint of the stage. Will Routley won the second mountain sprint.
In the last 82 kilometres, Jesse Anthony of the Kelly Benefit Strategies team attacked and took a third sprint ahead of Will Routley, Rubens and Jeremy Vennell.
In the final sprint of the race, the four men chased together in the third group with Rory Sutherland, Andy Schleck, Tom Danielson and Tejay Van Garderen tried best to catch Horner. But Horner was struggled hard to cross the four riders without any difficulty.
He said, "All mountain stages are difficult, but this one was difficult because there was no place to recover," he said. "But I surprised myself. I didn't expect to be up there."
Christopher Horner also took lead in the overall classification with the timing of 11 hours, 29 minutes and 32 second. His team-mate Levi Leipheimer was runner-up with 1 minutes and 15 seconds. Thomas Danielson finished third with the difference of 1 minute
and 22 seconds adrift.
The next stage will start in Seaside and end in Thomas Danielson. All the riders will cover the distance of 223.6 kilometres.
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